


If you close your eyes

by orphan_account



Series: If you close your eyes [1]
Category: The Hobbit (Jackson Movies)
Genre: Ableism, Abusive Family, Denial, Emotional Abuse, Eventual Smut, Fili is a little shit with issues, Happy Ending, M/M, Marriage of Convenience, Mourning, Ori just has issues, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Past Murder, Platonic Soulmates, Pregnancy, Racebending, Slow Burn, Soulmarks Suck, Soulmate-Identifying Marks, Spiders, Verbal Abuse, autistic Ori, character death happened before the story starts, dwarves have three sexes and at least as many genders, far too many spiders, mpreg of a sort, non-binary characters, past relationship
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-07-11
Updated: 2014-09-20
Packaged: 2018-02-08 10:14:05
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Major Character Death
Chapters: 30
Words: 66,261
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1936998
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Fili lost his brother, his friend, his One at the battle of the Five Armies.<br/>When Ori comes to him in the dead of night, begging for help and claiming he is carrying Kili's child, there's only one thing he can do. It matters little that he hates Ori, has always hated him.<br/>Some efforts must be made, for Kili's sake.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. bad news

**Author's Note:**

> welcomes and hello to yet another fic that I probably won't finish /o/  
> and also, welcome to "I have a type when I write Ori/Fili, and that type is reluctant-slow-build-and-being-brought-together-because-of-Kili". I am probably sorry. But then again, maybe not.  
> Also this is yet another experiment on sex and gender working differently for dwarves.
> 
> title from Bastille's Pompeii:  
> But if you close your eyes,  
> Does it almost feel like  
> Nothing changed at all?
> 
> Also mind the tags, they're here for a reason

Fili opened his door, and Ori was there, with his too large jumper and his usual air of terror. They had talked only once since the battle, right after it, and that had been months ago. The prince had not even thought of that clumsy, useless boy in all that time, except the few times Thorin had hinted that it would be nice of him to chat with Ori. Fili had ignored that every time. He had no reason to pretend anymore, and Ori, who knew how much the prince despised him, had been just smart enough to keep his distance. Until that night.

“I didn't know what to do,” the boy stuttered, his eyes red as if he'd been crying. “Mama would be angry, and adad would be so furious he'd... and I'm scared and you're the only one who knows, so...”

“Come,” Fili ordered, shoving him inside roughly and closing the door.

Whatever had Ori in that state, it had to be about Kili. He'd never have _dared_ to come for anything else, and if it concerned Kili, it had to stay private.

“What did you do then?” the prince grunted, before glaring at the boy. “You didn't _tell_ anyone, did you?”

Ori whimpered and shook his head, looking ready to cry. The _one_ time they had talked had been after the ceremony for the fallen warriors. Fili had put a blade to the boy's throat and promised that if he ever told anyone about his little fling with Kili, if he dared to sully his brother's name, Fili would kill him and leave his body to rot in the sun. Because even though Ori's brothers knew, and Thorin knew, they would never say anything of it. But Ori might. He was the weak link. He had always been.

“What _is_ it then? Why are you here?”

Ori sobbed something that Fili didn't quite catch.

“Louder! If you can't speak like a proper dwarf, get out and deal with your problem on your own!”

The boy sobbed louder, tears falling from his eyes as he cowered. Once, ages ago, when things were better and Fili sometimes managed to care, he had wondered sometimes why Ori was always so scared whenever someone raised their voice, until he had noticed that Kili, who friendly teased everyone, never did it near Ori, and he'd stopped caring because _once again_ , that damn boy was forcing Kili to fit to his expectations without giving anything in return.

“I'm with child,” Ori squeaked, barely louder, but Fili heard him perfectly this time.

“You're lying,” he gasped.

“I thought I was just sick,” Ori cried, shaking his head. “Adad said I was just pretending, but I... I went to ask Oin, and he said... he said... he said...”

Ori stopped and took a deep breath to calm himself, and Fili wanted to kill him.

“Who sired it then?” he spat. “Damn it, Kili hasn't been gone for half a year and you already found someone to fuck you? I always _knew_ you couldn't be his One!”

The boy looked wounded at that. More than usual, and not in the same way he usually did. There was a hint of despair in his eyes that Fili had only seen once before. He'd had a friend when he was younger, and ze had gotten with child too, when ze was even younger than Ori... Fili did not like to think about hir. He always felt he should have done more, should have helped, should have found a _way_... and he almost hated Ori for reminding him of that.

“Well, who is it?” the prince growled. “You're not going to tell me it's Kili, are you? I won't buy it.”

“I just need help,” Ori sobbed, shaking like a leaf. “I need help, please. I don't know what to _do_!”

“Your bastard is not my brother's child!”

“Won't be,” the boy stuttered. “Not if you don't want. But I need help. I need help. Please! You're the only one who can...”

Ori was sobbing and shaking so hard now that Fili thought he might collapse, which would force him to call for help. That was the only reason he pushed the boy into a chair. Not worry. Not curiosity.

Or maybe there _was_ some curiosity to it after all. Even if he was carrying Kili's child, he should never have come to see Fili about it, not with their history. He had a family, brothers, parents... cousins too, and Fili was almost sure he'd heard a grandfather mentioned once or twice. He _should_ have had friends too, because who didn't have them? And these were the people Ori _should_ have gone to after learning he was with child, not... someone who had threatened to kill him more than once.

“How can you even be with child,” Fili grunted. “I've _seen_ you naked during the quest, you're not a bearer, and you don't have the body type of a furkhsulâl.”

He'd have expected it from Nori, who was the _perfect_ furkhsulâl, even more than Fili. Ze was lean and graceful, and the prince knew more than one man or woman who would have either carried or sired children with Nori... though that usually stopped once they were given a chance to _talk_ to hir. The akôn did not have the most charming of personalities.

“Kili did not look like a sire,” Ori whispered slowly, barely a breath. “Still was one.”

“So you really _are_ going to pretend it is his child then?”

Ori's eyes darted toward the prince a few times, never daring to really look at him but still trying to observe him.

“Not demanding anything,” he said, barely a breath. “No one would believe me.”

Not true, Fili thought. Thorin would probably believe anything. He had approved of Ori and Kili. Said it had been _good_ for his nephew. And Dis could be easily convince too, if Ori played it well... and if the child had its sire's darker skin, then there would be no doubt for anyone.

“Then why are you here? If you're not going to say the child is Kili's, why...”

“Adad will kill me,” Ori said, his voice weak but steady. “If I go home. If I tell him. He will kill me.”

“You're being overdramatic,” Fili spat, but Brein had said the same all those years ago, and rather than to risk going home, ze'd tried running away to the surface in the middle of winter. Hir body hadn't been found until spring, or at least the remains of it. They'd been lucky to find hir at all.

Fili hated Ori, and he had threatened the boy more than once, but that wasn't the same. There was a difference between wishing somebody dead and seeing them on the verge of making it come true.

“Adad had a sister,” Ori sobbed. “She had a baby when she wasn't married, when I was very little. So they beat her. She died. I don't want to die.”

“Could get rid of the baby,” Fili suggested.

There were herbs, he knew that. But Ori shook his head fiercely, his arms curling protectively around his stomach.

“Don't want it to die either”, he sobbed, starting to cry again. “Can't. Even if I can't have it claimed, it's still... I have nothing else left, just that, and I can't... I _can't_! I'd rather go again against a dragon, against orcs! But I can't... it's mine, it's _ours_.”

The young scribe was crying and shaking like a child, but for a second, Fili saw what Kili must have seen too. It was easy, when all was quiet, to forget that Ori had fought the same battles as them, and without the same training. It was easy to forget he was brave, and as strong willed as any dwarf, because he usually _wasn't_... but Fili wasn't sure he would have had the courage to go to someone who hated him to beg for help this way. Nor would he ever have accepted to bear a child when he'd been Ori's age, not even if he'd been married, not even if it were for a dead lover...

“So what, you're going to raise it alone? You're not even old enough to own a house!”

Ori only shook harder, still curled on himself as if he thought someone might hurt the child...

“Is it really Kili's?” Fili asked.

“I'll never tell anyone, I swear,” Ori cried. “Even the baby will never know. I just need _help_.”

That was enough of an answer, Fili decided, not that he really thought that Ori had ever lain with anyone beside Kili. To be fair, it was a surprise that even his brother might have managed it, considering how that damn boy couldn't stand being touched, never even letting Kili kiss him or hold his hand, at least in public. But if Ori had ever changed his mind, it could only have been for Kili. And if there really was a child, it was Fili's nephew.

Kili's child.

And Fili had not always understood his brother where Ori was concerned, but he knew this: Kili would _never_ forgive him if he abandoned his child, because Kili would never have done it in his place, would never have even _considered_ it. He would have made sure the baby was provided for, and that it always would be.

“When did it happen? You and Kili... the child, when was it...”

“Before the battle,” Ori sobbed quietly. “Just once. I never thought... no one ever... not after just _once_...”

“We are going to say that the child is mine,” Fili decided, and that shocked Ori so much that he stopped crying and looked up. “We are going to say that we got drunk after the funeral, and since we were both so sad at losing a brother and a friend, we gave each other comfort. I will marry you, claim the child as my own, and make sure it is brought according to his rank.”

Ori hesitated, stuttering meaningless sounds and sobs, his arms tight around his stomach.

“You wanted help, didn't you?” Fili snarled. “I'm giving it to you. You won't get a better offer! Who else will care for you and your _bastard_? But if you don't like it, if this still isn't good enough for you, you can go back to your father, and see what help he'll bring you!”

That might have been a bit too much because Ori flinched and whimpered as if he'd been hit, but Fili felt his anger rise again. He was trying to be good, he was trying to help, and that foolish scribe was still afraid of him instead of being _grateful_. But Fili managed to keep his calm. This wasn't about Ori. It was about Kili's child, and how someone needed to care for it. Even if Ori's family wasn't as bad as he seemed to think, that baby needed to have someone who could be a decent parent to it, and that wasn't going to be Ori.

“Come here tomorrow morning at eight,” Fili ordered. “We will go see my mother and tell her about the child, and how we are going to marry. Don't be late. If you don't come, I will have to go alone and you can be sure it will _not_ be forgiven.”

Ori nodded, looking anywhere but at Fili.

“And would it kill you to say thank you? It's not exactly a dream for me to have to marry someone like _you_ , you could at least try to be a little grateful!”

“Th-thank you.”

“That's better. Now leave, and try to get some sleep. And I swear, try not to cry so much tomorrow in front of my mother. I'm not asking you to pretend to love me, but would it be so hard to act a little friendly sometimes? You know, like a normal person?”

“I'll do my b-best...”

His best wouldn't be much, but it would have to do. Still, Fili decided that he'd have to make sure that he'd do most of the talking... not that this should be a problem. Ori didn't talk much when he was nervous, and he was _always_ nervous.

“You may go,” Fili generously announced. “Don't forget to be here on time tomorrow.”

Ori squeaked something that might have been a promise, or an apology, or just a squeak, and he left Fili alone with his anger and his guilt. Kili had begged him, times and times again, to be nicer to Ori, to be friendly, but the eldest prince had never managed it. How could he, when the scribe had hurt his brother so much when Kili had first fallen for him, before forcing him to change before he deigned to even give him his friendship. Kili had said, more than once, that Fili didn't understand, but his brother had never listened.

And maybe, just maybe, there had been some jealousy in there too, because they had always been enough for each other before that. They'd had friends, many of them. But neither of them had ever wanted a lover before Ori came into their lives, and Fili still did not understand why his brother had suddenly changed his mind, and for someone like that, too. Even when he'd known how much it upset Kili, he'd never managed to stop hating Ori, because what wasn't there to hate?

But he might learn to tolerate that boy, he decided, mindlessly rubbing his thumb against the faded name on his wrist. For the sake of Kili's child, he would have to.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> a little vocabulary:  
> furkhsulâl: someone who can both bear and sire children  
> akôn: someone who is neither a man nor a woman  
> (the dwarves probably also have the equivalent of genderqueer/genderfluid/agender and other options, but I don't know yet if anyone in the fic will be in that situation)


	2. telling the family pt1

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Dis is told about her son's intentions

Dis was less than happy at the news of the pregnancy, and shouted a fair bit at both of them, making it clear she did  _ not  _ approve of her son having fooled around with a boy barely old enough to enter a contract. Fili feared for a moment that Ori might break into tears, as he had done with him the night before, but the scribe remained calm. The only sign of distress in him was the way his hands clenched on his tunic, and Fili only noticed that because Kili had told him about it once. Except for this detail, the boy was emotionless.

Once she was done shouting, Dis made them some tea, and asked them what they intended to do about the situation.

"I'll marry him," Fili replied. "I've never expected to marry for love anyway, and this way, the line is secured. It's the best thing to do."

"And are you fine with this, Ori?"

"I don’t have a soulmate,," the scribe said with a quiet, fake smile. "And if I must have a child, at least this way it'll be safe. Kili told me a lot about you, I know you will be nice to the baby."

Dis smiled sadly, and took his hand.

"I will do my best to be a good grandmother, even if I'm still angry at both of you for being so careless. But having lost a brother and a close friend, I suppose you can be excused. People will probably find this terribly romantic. There is only one thing that worries me... You father is Naren son of Nern, isn't he?"

"Yes, Ma'am."

"And your grandfather must be Nern, son of Oran then."

Ori nodded slowly, and Dis's expression turned serious.

"Then when we go see your parents tonight, I will ask that you come live with us in the palace right away," she announced. "Make sure to pack whatever you will want to bring with you. After all, if you are to marry the heir to the throne, you need to be trained for it, don't you?"

Something about Ori's eager nodding and the way Dis was gently rubbing her thumb against the back of his hand was strange. Fili felt like he was missing some elements to fully understand the conversation, and he didn't like it. He was too smart to complain though. Things were going well. Dis seemed almost happy to finally meet Ori, after all that Kili had talked about him, or maybe it was just the perspective of a grandchild that had her in such a good mood. Fili had heard her say sometimes that, since her sons were bound to one another, she truly feared neither of them might ever manage to have children.

“ Don't tell you parents we're coming, Ori dear,” She told the boy, and that too was odd because Dis was not the sort to surprise people, not for anything important. “I will be coming with Thorin, and you  _ will _ be coming back with us no matter what, is that clear?”

“ Yes Ma'am.”

“ And call me Dis. If you are to marry my son, you can use my name, at least in private.”

Ori smiled, and he looked sincere for once.

After that, they talked for a little while. More exactly, Dis talked and they listened, as she repeated how disappointed she was by their behaviour, and what sorts of accommodations they would need to prepare for Ori, and a few advices here and there about how to care for a baby. Eventually she remembered that she still needed to tell Thorin, and that Ori had to go pack his things, so she let the scribe go, and only kept her son with her for a few more minutes.

“I don’t know what’s happening here,” she told him, looking frighteningly serious, “and I’m not sure I like it. I remember how upset you were whenever your brother spoke of that boy, and I also remember that Kili was half in love with him, and even if I’ve never been able to see them together, I have good reasons to believe Ori liked him too. So whatever you are doing here, be careful.”

“I don’t know what you…”

“I mean,” Dis cut him dryly, “that you are my son, and I love you more than anything. But if you hurt that boy, I swear before Mahal that you will regret it, because I raised you better than that. Am I clear?”

The prince nodded, crossing his arms on his chest.

“ I won’t do  _ anything  _ to him. I don’t give a damn about him. I just care about the baby, and I know that Ori will have to be around and to be in a good state to help care for it, so of course I won’t hurt him.”

Dis glared at him.

“I don’t want to hear you talk like that in public, is that clear? We’re going to present this as a romantic story, so I hope you will manage to fake some affection for that boy, at least for a year or two. It won’t really surprise anyone if you fall apart after that. No one expects an unbound relationship to last.”

Her son shrugged. She’d know about that of course. Her sire had been Thrain’s One, but it was his first spouse who had born Thorin and Frerin, the uncle Fili had never really known. Another proof that real love existed only within a bound, and that Kili should have known  _ better  _ than to fool around with a boring, unfeeling kid.

“I’ll do my best,” Fili promised. “I can lie through my teeth and look convinced of it, like a good prince.”

His mother glared again, never happy when he said anything about diplomacy being just a nicer word for lying. They used to have fights about that. Kili had always been the diplomatic one, if only because he liked making friends and pleasing people.

“I think it would be good if you came tonight,” Dis said after a moment, staring thoughtfully at her son. “You have never met Ori’s family, have you?”

“I know his siblings. Decent people. Nori’s a friend now, or near enough.”

They talked and had a drink sometimes, when Nori had time for it. Or rather, Fili would drink and Nori would chat and eat, but rarely  _ drink  _ as such. Didn’t like alcohol, ze said. Neither did Dori and Ori, come to think of it.

“Yes, you will be coming too,” Dis decided. “But you are not to say a word when we are there, is that clear? You will just watch and listen, unless I give you permission for more. If this goes the way I expect it to, this should be… of interest to you.”

Fili shrugged. He couldn’t imagine how anything concerning Ori could be of interest to him, but he knew better than to protest. His mother was angry enough about the situation. Taking his silence for agreement, Dis dismissed her son, and Fili all but ran to his duties. Even discussing the quotas of the mushroom farms would feel fun after that conversation.

 

* * *

 

It had not taken long for Fili to forget entirely about Ori. He had a fair amount of practice helping him, of course. He had spent the last few years pretending very hard that the damn boy didn’t exist, so that as long as he didn’t actually see Ori, or that Kili didn’t talk about him, Fili could pretend that everything was right. When his uncle came to fetch him to go meet Ori’s parents, the prince realized that he might have to change his habits. No matter how much he despised that emotionless boy, he could not longer afford to just act as if didn’t exist. Not if they were going to be married, not if they were going to have a child together. It made him furious at Ori once again, which was rather against the point of course, but couldn’t be helped. Fili had always hated all the concessions Kili was forced to make around Ori, and his blood burned in anger and shame now that he had to make efforts too.

He kept his calm though, and left his office with Thorin. His uncle remained silent as they walked the corridors of the palace, but Fili knew that he would have to deal with a lecture sooner or later. It was all because of Ori… and it was for Kili. The prince would do anything for his brother, could do anything for him. This was for Kili, and for Kili’s child. Kili who had been his brother, his friend, his One, Kili whose half faded name name was still on his wrist, would always remain there, Kili…

“I did not tell your mother about your brother and Ori,” Thorin said, his voice colder than Fili had ever heard it. “And since it appears you have not either, you will remain silent about it. Ori is the only one with a right to ever discuss what was happening between your brother and him. Do you understand?”

“Yes, uncle.”

“And I have to tell you that I am disappointed in you. I did not approve when you were cruel to the boy before we lost your brother, because he always tried to gain your approbation, if nothing else…”

Fili sniggered at that. Could not help it. He’d never noticed Ori trying anything, but even if he really had, the boy’s chances of success would have been non-existent.

“ I find it no laughing matter!” Thorin scolded him. “If you were cruel before, what does that make you  _ now _ , do you think? I have told you times and times again to talk to Ori, because he had suffered the same loss as you, and you have never had anything but insults for him, even though such a thing had happened? I thought we had raised you to be better than that.”

“I’m sorry, uncle,” Fili mumbled, feeling ashamed even though he knew he had done nothing wrong. It wasn’t him who had gotten Ori with child. He would have been angry at Kili for making him deal with his mistakes, but since he couldn’t be angry at his brother, not with things what they were, it just made him hate Ori even more. It was his fault, after all. If he hadn’t seduced Kili, none of this would have happened.

If Ori hadn’t been there, maybe Kili would still live. A silly thought to be having, and one that he knew rationally to be untrue, but Fili still wondered sometimes.

“I don’t think you are sorry, not yet,” Thorin sighed. “I hope you really will be, one day. Which is why I will not ask you to apologize to him now. When I do it, I want it to be sincere.”

The prince nodded. In a few months then, maybe after the baby’s birth, he would apologize to Ori. He could fake sincerity well enough. He was a prince after all, that came with the job. If Thorin could welcome Bard with a smile on his face, then Fili could certainly pretend he had learned to tolerate that unfeeling boy.

“ When we are with his family, try not to despise him too openly,” Thorin advised his nephew. “You’re not nearly as subtle about it as you think you are.”

 


	3. telling the family pt2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Ori's family is told, and they are considerably less nice about it than Fili's.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> warning for abusing family, verbal and emotional abuse

“Well, see adad,” Naren said with a satisfied smirk, “told you the little slug wasn’t just getting fat. I knew he’d end up getting knocked up like a cheap whore.”

Sitting next to him, Ori’s grandfather shrugged, and muttered something about the boy also being too fat anyway. On their side of the table Dori and his mother looked uncomfortable and avoided looking at the royal family, but Ori, sitting between his mother and father, remained unfazed. He was staring at his own knees, his expression so neutral that Fili wondered if he had even heard the insult. But of course he had. Ori heard everything, Kili joked sometimes, even the slightest whispers.

“We’ll take care of it, don’t you worry,” Naren promised, smirking grimly. “Thanks for warning us.”

“I think you do not understand,” Dis protested, visibly shaken. “There is nothing for you to take care of. Fili is going to marry your son, and…”

“Why would he do that?” Naren asked, clearly surprised. “There’s no need. Can’t even be sure it’s really his, can we?”

Fili clenched his fists and forced himself to look down. How _dared_ that man. It had taken but a few days to the company to know that Ori would never let anyone touch him even in a friendly fashion. Even Kili had not managed to touch his for ages. How could Ori’s own father think that his son would be one for casual encounters knowing this? And even if Ori had been the sort to make a move on anyone, he would not have deserved to be treated that way!

It wasn’t that Fili wanted to defend the boy, of course.

But he had reasons to despise Ori, legitimate ones, whereas the boy’s father just seemed to enjoy cheap attacks on someone who couldn’t protect himself.

“I’m pretty sure the child is mine,” Fili grunted, ignoring the way his mother glared at him for speaking without permission. “And even if it isn’t, it’s too late now. Gave my word. Even if we don’t share the same blood, the child is mine, and I intend to marry him.”

He looked at Ori’s mother then, because Ari felt like the safest person to look at.

“If this is what Ori wants,” she said tentatively, trying to catch her youngest son’s eyes. In vain. The boy was still staring right at his knees, as if he couldn’t hear nor see anything.

“Of course that’s what he wants,” Ori’s grandfather grunted (Nern, Fili remembered he was called) “Why else would he have gotten himself knocked up by a prince? Shouldn’t take him in your family, highness. Bad seed, that one. All quiet up front, but in truth he’s nasty and scheming, just like his grandmother.”

“And yet we will take that risk,” Dis replied firmly with a tight smile. “Ori and Fili are going to marry, and when we leave in a few minutes, Ori will be coming with us. As the husband of a future king, there is much he needs to learn, and it will be easier if he can get used to his new environment as soon as possible.”

She tried, too, to catch Ori’s attention, with as little success as Ari. Naren laughed.

“You’ll need time if you hope to turn him into someone who can appear in public. Look at him, can’t even understand that we’re talking about him. I don’t even know how he survived in your little thing with the dragon. Can you hear us, boy?” Naren shouted, making Ori tense, and then slapping his son’s shoulder roughly before laughing again. “You might as well talk to a wall. Still, I don’t know about letting him go like that. Can’t be good for him, changing habits so fast, and who says you won’t make him work too hard? Beside, we need him here. He does his part of the chores, you know.”

Dis and Thorin exchanged a look then, whereas Fili realized he was biting the inside of his cheeks to keep silent. He was angry at Nern and Naren, for the way they were insulting their own kin that way, as if it were normal. He was furious at Ori too, for not saying anything, for acting as if he were mute and deaf, when Fili knew that he was capable of standing his ground when he needed to. Someone who could fight trolls, goblins and orcs and giant spiders should not have been afraid of anything, and certainly not of people who were just _talking_.

Naren was right in this at least: it would take a lot of work to make Ori even vaguely fit to appear in public.

“Whatever Ori does to help, I am sure you can find someone to help you with it,” Thorin said, and _he_ wasn’t even trying to smile. “There are plenty of dwarves you can hire to do your dishes or sweep the floor for you.”

“There might be, but we’re not made of money,” Nern retorted.

“I could pay for it,” Dori said tentatively, smiling at Ori. “If it was to help my baby brother be happy…”

Dori did not look at Fili, and the prince made a point of looking away too. They both knew that whatever was between Fili and Ori wasn’t, would never be love, and the young dwarf dared not imagine what Dori might be imagining about how the future baby had been conceived. The prince might even have to tell his future brother-in-law the truth… and to Nori too, of course, or else Ori might soon become a widower.

“Your money is _our_ money,” Nern told Dori. “Don’t go wasting it because that idiot boy couldn’t keep his legs closed.” He turned toward Dis and Thorin then, and smirked. “If you want the boy and his bastard, then we get to keep his share of the treasure, and you pay for someone to replace him and help around the house. Take it or leave it.”

“A quarter of his share,” Dis retorted before her son or brother could react, “and we will be paying only for the first ten years, after which you must figure this out on your own. And before you try to negotiate, do try to keep in my that I could just take the boy and leave with him now. He has given his consent and chosen to marry my son, and he is old enough to make this decision on his own. I am humouring you because you are his family. Refuse my offer, and get nothing.”

Nern tried to protest, but Naren was a smarter dwarf than his father and he quickly agreed to that deal. Neither Ari nor Dori seemed to happy with this turn of even, and Fili wondered if they too felt as if they had just witnessed the sale of Ori to the royal family, as if he’d been nothing more than a pretty trinket. They both covered Ori in hugs and kisses, which he allowed placidly, until Dis asked him to go get his things.

“What things?” Nern exploded. “You’re robbing us of half our money, you don’t really expect that we’ll let him take anything with him after that? You buy him clothes and the rest, he’s not taking anything.”

Dis’s patience was running thin, and she looked ready to grab Ori by the wrist and take him away right there and then.

But Ori, for the first time since the start of the conversation, reacted to what he’d heard. Distressed noises escaped from his throat, and he was looking imploringly at both the princess and his grand-father, his hands shaking hard as he tried to sign the word “please” in Iglishmek. Even Fili felt sorry for him then.

Sorry enough that he removed three beads from his hair, and threw them on the table toward Nern.

“This is _mithril_ ,” he growled. “Whatever Ori will be taking with him won’t be worth even a _tenth_ of this. So he’s going to go get it now, and then you’re going to leave him alone, am I clear?”

It was insulting, the way Nern and Naren each carefully inspected a bead before agreeing, as if Fili might be trying to cheat them, but the prince said nothing. He had already broken his mother’s command twice, he did not want to anger her more.

When at last Ori was allowed to run to his room, he didn’t stay there very long. He came back carrying only a small bundle, which Fili recognised as the coat he’d been given in Esgaroth, so many months earlier, and two books. It was odd for the prince to imagine that anyone could carry everything that mattered to them in so little space. But then again, Ori was an odd boy, wasn’t he? And he seemed so relieved to even have that, but held the bundle and the book close to his chest, as if he were afraid that someone might try to take it away after all.

Even when they left, and Dis offered to carry things for him, Ori shook his head and tightened his hands on these few belongings he’d retained. She tried to insist, but he became so tense that she thought it better to let it go. It didn’t seem too heavy anyway, and he wasn’t at the six month of his pregnancy: he still had a month or two before he really had to be careful.

* * *

  


Ori looked ready to cry when Dis and Fili showed the bedroom that would now be his. Not letting go of his bundle and his books, he looked around with the air of someone who expected to wake up at any moment. It was large enough, with a window (a true luxury in the mountain), and while Dis had not had time to have it really furnished yet, she had still managed to make it feel welcoming.

“It would have been Kili’s,” she sighed, absently arranging the sheets on the small bed, the only piece of furniture yet. Ori’s smile instantly disappeared, but she didn’t notice. “You will have a dining room in common with Fili, as well as the drawing room, but there’s two smaller rooms that only you can access. I think one should be the nursery, and the other will be for anything you want it to be. You are an artist, I’m told?”

“Just a scribe,” Ori mumbled, looking down at his feet.

“I don’t think you are _just_ anything,” Dis protested with a smile. “Thorin showed me what you wrote and drew during your travels, and I think it is _very_ good. Now, have you had dinner yet? No? Well, make yourself comfortable here, Fili and I are going to see if we can find anything nice that you could borrow from him for tonight, then we’ll have dinner together. We’ll get you clothes of your own made tomorrow, but for now, this will have to do.”

Ori nodded quietly, while Fili opened his mouth to protest, and then thought better of it. He followed his mother to the drawing room, and then his own apartments. She did not say a word to him until they were in front of his wardrobe, and she was trying to find something that would fit.

“I’m proud of what you did earlier,” she said quietly, not looking at him. “I should be cross that you disobeyed me, but at least you did it in a good way, and so I forgive you. I can’t believe we had to pay to… I cannot believe _money_ was their only concern! I dare not think what they might have done to him if…”

“I think his mother and Dori would have tried to protect him. Nori certainly would have, if only to annoy Naren and Nern.”

Fili had always thought that Nori’s stories of not getting along with hir step-father simply because ze resented that hir mother had married anyone but hir own sire. He wasn’t so sure about that anymore. Nori wasn’t Ori. When people attacked hir, ze fought back, and ze did it the dirty way to make sure ze _won_.

“Well, I’m still glad we got that poor boy out of there,” Dis said. “And I hope we can keep these people away from him in the future. But for now… which tunic, do you think?”

“Purple is his favourite colour,” Fili said with a shrug. Something Kili had told him once, and that he had not managed to _not_ memorize. Beside, the other tunic his mother showed him was blue, and Fili did not feel ready to see Ori wear that colour, not yet. It was a colour that the royal family had always favoured, and that particular shade had always looked very nice on Kili. Fili did not want to see that boy wear something that could have belonged to his brother.

“Change into something nicer too,” Dis ordered him, “and then go wait in the drawing room. We shouldn’t be long, I think.”

Fili agreed, and obeyed, even if it annoyed him that he had to change because of Ori. It didn’t usually matter what he wore at dinner, unless they were eating with someone important. But Ori was not important. Never would be. His child was important, but not him, and to be forced to pretend otherwise… But still, he obeyed, and went to wait, as he had been told.

As Dis had promised, it wasn’t long before she appeared with Ori who wore Fili’s tunic. The prince felt odd, looking at the dwarf he was now engaged to. Ori was so _small_ without his too large jumpers, and since the tunic was, in fact, a little tight for him, it made his stomach stand out. He wasn’t a slight dwarf (“soft and round everywhere,” Kili had giggled once, as if his brother _cared_ ) but the softness of his belly wasn’t _all_ due to fat. Dressed as he was, it wasn’t hard to see that Ori was with child, and just starting to show.

Kili’s child.

Fili felt half tempted to touch Ori’s stomach, to speak to his unborn nibling and promise it that it would be loved and cared for, that what had happened earlier was something its family would never do to it. He didn’t though, unsure how Ori and his mother would react to it. Still, he felt less angry after that, though he did not notice it himself.

He was doing this for Kili, and his brother had been, and always would be, worth any sacrifice.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Asparklethatisblue used in a fic the idea that dwarven pregnancies are different. Mostly, they're not as visible, and the bearer is pretty much free to move and do things normally until almost the very end (but as a result, dwarven babies are smaller compared to other races) and I've decided to use that same idea. That's how Ori can be six months pregnant easily hide it under a couple of large jumpers (well, that and a bit of denial of pregnancy of course)


	4. telling the family pt3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Nori is not happy about his brother's engagement

Fili didn’t know why he had to be present to so many of Ori’s lessons. He half suspected an attempt by his mother to prove him that the boy was nice and likeable. In which case, her plan was a failure, and only made him despise Ori a little more. At the moment they were just trying to teach him how to stay calm in public, so that he could smile and wave and say a few words when the engagement would be publicly announced. That, too, was a failure. In the two days that he’d been there, Ori hadn’t managed once to fake happiness. Nor cheerfulness. Truth be told, Fili was sure his mother would have been happy with Ori just looking like he didn’t want to run away, at that point.

“You need to relax, dear,” she told him, not for the first time that afternoon. “No one here is going to hurt you. You know that, right?”

Ori nodded, but his face was still as blank as ever. Fili half wondered if he was doing it on purpose. Certainly, no one could be that expressionless by accident. Beside, he had seen Ori show emotions before. When he’d come to beg for help a few nights before, or when he’d been alone with Kili, or… well, that was about all of it, but then again, Fili hadn’t exactly looked much at Ori, of course. Not unless he had been with Kili.

"Try to smile dear,” Dis insisted, smiling herself. “I know this is a lot to take in, but try to smile. Pretend I am a friend and smile at me.”

“Pretend that she’s Kili,” Fili suggested. “ _Then_ you might smile, right?”

Dis glared at her son, but Ori’s only reaction was to clench his fingers on the pretty new tunic he’d been gifted the day before. Fili hated the way he did that. Mostly, he hated remembering the way Kili would sometimes put his hands on the boy’s to comfort him, because Kili had the same for his brother sometimes, when Fili felt nervous.

“Fili, be nice,” his mother scolded him.

“I am nice. I’m trying to help. Isn’t that why I’m here?”

“You are here because you need to make efforts too, Fili,” Dis replied, putting one arm around Ori’s shoulders and not seeing the way he tensed and fought not to push her away. “The two of you are supposed to be in love, I’ve told you. And while Ori can get away with being shy, _you_ cannot be rude and disdainful.”

Not fair, Fili wanted to yell, because he was not the one carrying anyone’s child, and he wasn’t the one who couldn’t _act_ , and he wasn’t the one who couldn’t _feel_ . This was all for Kili, but even with that in mind, he suddenly wasn’t sure if it would be worth it. He wanted to call off everything, or to tell the truth, or just to have his brother back. None of these things were possible though, not _really_.

“He doesn’t like being touched,” Fili said instead, perfectly faking a concerned smile. “Even his siblings avoid it.”

Even Kili avoided it, he didn’t add. Didn’t have to. Dis quickly removed her arm, and asked Ori if it was true.

“My poor boy, you should have told me!” she said when he nodded. “Ori, you have to say it if I do something you don’t like. I don’t want to make you uncomfortable, but you have to tell me things, understood?”

Ori nodded of course, but Fili doubted he would ever say anything. Kili had complained about that at first, until they apparently figured out a way to communicate, or until he just got used to never knowing what was the matter with that unfeeling ball of wool he’d taken for a boyfriend… but no, that wasn’t like Kili. He must have figured out a way to understand Ori, because he wasn’t the sort to ignore problems and pretend they didn’t exist. Not like Fili had done about this whole thing.

“How long do you have until you must go to your uncle’s council, Fili?” Dis asked. “I’d like to rehearse a little the story we are going to tell, but only if we have time.”

“I have at least half an hour. It should be plenty enough for _me_.”

Dis glared at him again, but did not protest again. Her son wondered if it was because she thought him hopeless, or because she was growing to realize that _Ori_ was.

  


After the council, Fili was supposed to go back to see his mother and Ori. Having already lost his entire morning in their company, he decided that it was useless, and that he had more important things to do. It was all very well, this baby and engagement business, but he still had work to do, and he knew that his mother and uncle would later appreciate the fact that he’d not forgotten it.

But as soon as Fili had closed the door of his office, he felt a blade against his throat, and his left arm was twisted painfully behind his back before he was pushed against the wall.

“What have you done to my brother?” Nori growled in his ear.

“Nothing, I swear!” Fili quickly replied.

He’d known his friend wouldn’t be happy, but he’d hoped to have until the formal announcement before having this conversation. Apparently, he’d underestimated Nori.

“I know my baby brother,” the other dwarf said between clenched teeth. “And I know you, too. I know Ori would never have _willingly_ had anyone but Kili, and I know you can’t get near Ori without wanting to hurt him. And now you’ve gotten him with chid. You better explain that, or I swear to Mahal that you’ll never sire any more children.”

Fili nodded slightly, mindful of the blade against his skin. Just as he’d feared, he would not be able to lie to Nori. It was almost a relief, in a way. He would have someone to share his secret then, someone to whom he could actually _talk_ to.

“The child is Kili’s,” he explained. “Before the battle, Ori and him...well. And then when Ori realized he came to b… to _ask_ for help.”

“Why you?” Nori growled, pressing hir knife harder against the prince’s skin. “Why would he ever ask _you_? And why would you help him?”

“Because the child is _Kili’s_. What else could I do?”

The blade withdrew at last, and Nori forced Fili to turn around to look him in the eye. It was something the prince usually avoided these days… something everyone avoided. Nori had always had an intense glare, but the eye of gold and diamond ze’d started using to replace the one lost in the battle was… hard to look at. Fili still forced himself to do it, and hoped Nori would see he was not lying.

“Why claim the child?” the akôn asked, and ze did not seem so angry now, just curious. “If Ori had said it was Kili’s, Dori and I would have supported his claim, and so would have Thorin I’m sure.”

“Still would have been a bastard though,” Fili grimaced. “The bastard of a prince and a child, wouldn’t that have looked nice. I can imagine only too well what people would have said about Kili.”

“Yeah, and instead they’re gonna say it ‘bout you now.”

Fili shrugged. He was a prince. He was used to dealing with rumours and gossips, he’d been trained to ignore them or debunk them depending on circumstances. He was alive to fight and prove that he was good. Kili, however, was dead, and a scandal like that would have remained attached to his name for ever. Instead of being the heroic prince who died to save his uncle, his king, he would have become that debauched monster who had seduced a child and knocked him up. People would laugh and say he’d died just in time to avoid troubles.

“I’ve got to protect Kili,” Fili eventually said. “Even now. He’s my brother, and better I be despised than him.”

Maybe there was a little spite to it too. Maybe Fili wanted to make a great sacrifice for his brother, because Kili had not wanted to give up on his fling with Ori, not even for his brother’s sake. Maybe Fili wanted to be the better brother, even if no one would ever know. But Nori didn’t need to be told that.

“If you hurt Ori, I will kill you,” ze said. “You’re not the only one who wants to protect their family. Still, I’m glad you didn’t sire that kid. Would have sucked to kill you. I rather like you and all.”

“You just say that ‘cause I’m the one paying when we go to the tavern.”

“As good a reason as any to like someone, isn’t it? Now, about the kid, who else knows? Thorin?”

“Just you, me and Ori,” Fili admitted, and then, feeling the surprise of the other dwarf, he added, “Ma and uncle, they have these illusions about Kili. They think he was always sweet and nice and innocent. I want them to keep their ideas, you know? I want them to still believe that he was a good kid, a little reckless, but good anyway.”

Not that Kili hadn’t been good of course, but people would see it that way. Even Dis would see it that way, wouldn’t see that it was all Ori’s fault, that he’d seduced her son… (of course that wasn’t true, and parts of Fili knew it, but he still pretended. If he pretended hard enough, he might forget one day that he had not been enough for Kili, that his brother had not been satisfied with just brotherly love, that Kili had betrayed him…)(It felt so much better to blame Ori for it, because betrayal was easier to accept when it came from someone you didn’t love)

“Can’t say I approve,” Nori replied. “But your family, your choice. _I_ am going to tell Dori. Fucking Mordor, he’s going to be relieved I think. We really didn’t want to have to kill you. He was already wondering what we should do with your body.”

Fili did not laugh. He knew the siblings well enough to know this wasn’t a joke. They were fiercely protective of each other these three, and after what he’d seen of their family, Fili thought he understood why.

“Tell Dori to keep quiet about it, okay? And to not tell anyone, not even your mother. No offence, but…”

“Dori’s clever, princeling. We all know what we can tell Ma, and what might be repeated to Naren. Even Ori knows he’s got to be careful, and Mahal knows the boy still trusts too easily. There’s a reason neither he nor Dori said they wanted to join your uncle until after they signed their contracts. We all know how to be careful.”

“I’m surprised you haven’t killed Naren yet, to be fair,” Fili blurted. “With the way he treats Ori…”

“I tried, once,” Nori confessed. “Ma stopped me and begged for his life. Said he would change, wouldn’t ever hit Ori again… and you know, I think he hasn’t. A shame. You can show bruises to a guard and say that guy is beating his kid, but words? They only leave a trace in the mind, and that’s not so easy to show. But I promised Ma, and then later I promised Ori, and so there’s not much I can do.”

Ze looked as if ze wished he could do something though, and as if it pained him that he hadn’t been able to protect hir brother better. Fili tried to imagine what he would have done for Kili in similar circumstances, but it was too difficult. Their sire would never have hurt them while she was alive, and Dis would never have just let it happen, nor would have Thorin. Fili had always thought that no parent could hurt their child without a reason, but he was not so sure anymore. Just because  _he_ had good reasons to hate Ori did not mean that the boy’s father had any.

Maybe that was what pushed to speak again.

“Ori will be safe now, you know. My mother will protect him, she really likes him. And Thorin does too. You _know_ Thorin likes him. Naren won’t ever touch him again. Not him, and never his kid. They’ll be protected. _I_ will protect them.”

“ _You_?” Nori sniggered.

“It’s what Kili would have wanted. It’s what he would have done.”

And Fili wasn’t Kili, and he didn’t approve or understand his brother’s choices, but he could do that at least. Because no matter how much he despised Ori, no one should be forced to beg to take just two books and what few things could fit inside a coat when they left their house. No one should have to pay for their _own_ things.

“Just focus on being a good dad to his kid,” Nori said. “Don’t think your brother would have asked for more than that. Don’t think _Ori_ would want more than that. So be a good dad, and we’ll worry about the rest.”

Fili promised to do his best, but he wasn’t sure if he could do that. He’d never really considered being a father before Ori came to him that night. Never thought he’d ever have to think about it although, if he were very honest, he’d always suspected he’d be an uncle one day, even long before Ori came into their lives. But that was not something he wanted to think about, so he changed the subject and asked about the latest security issues in the kingdom.

Thieves, murderers and assassins felt a less frightening subject than fatherhood.

 


	5. engagement party

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> because even hasty engagements deserve a party

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warning for internalised ableism

Ori did manage to smile and wave and say how happy when the engagement was officially announced. Fili thought it all looked faked and forced, but people apparently took it to mean that the boy was simply shy and a little awed at all the good things happening to him. Later there was a party, and Ori still smiled and noded at people, even if he couldn’t quite manage to talk to them. Dis looked proud of him, and Dori and Ari did too. If he were very honest, Fili would have to admit that he was too. Or if not proud, impressed. He had seen Ori at dances and festival in Ered Luin, and then at official banquets in Erebor. Ori usually dealt with large gathering of people by withdrawing within himself until he could make his escape. The boy was making a real effort to not do it that night, and it was not easy on him.

After the first hour, Ori was almost shaking from exhaustion, startling and tensing every time someone started a conversation or touched him (and they all touched him, grabbing his shoulder to get his attention, patting him on the back to congratulate him). It annoyed Fili that he would one day have to rule with a consort who couldn’t stand crowded places. It annoyed him even more that Dis was in deep conversation with Ari and a few other dams, that Dori was chatting with Balin, that Thorin was talking with some nobles, and none of them noticed that Ori was close to tears. What annoyed him most though was that he knew what had to be done to help Ori, because Kili had told him.

He should not have noticed Ori’s distress. He should not have known what to do. And he really wished he could pretend this wasn’t his business, but if his future husband broke into tears in the middle of the room, it would reflect badly on him.

“Sorry, I’ve got to borrow him for a moment,” Fili told the two dwarves chatting at Ori, before grabbing his fiancé’s wrist and pulling him away.

He didn’t let go until they were on a balcony, and then he closed the curtains behind them. No one would mind that they should want some privacy, and it might help with that lie about them being in love.

As soon as they were shielded from the world, Ori sat down (almost collapsed, really), hugging his knees and hiding his face against his thighs. When he started rocking slightly, Fili felt sorry for him, and then angry that he’d felt sorry.

“Can’t stay here long,” Fili warned him. “In five minutes, my mother will notice that we’ve gone, and she’ll worry.”

Ori nodded, but did not answer. Fili had not expected him to.

They probably stayed hidden more than five minutes in the end. Ori needed time to calm down, and Fili enjoyed the quiet more than he would have liked to admit. It was a nice late spring night, warm, with a clear sky full of stars, and the prince liked being outside. He missed it, missed the wind, the sky, the noises, the openness. Missed the hunting trips with his brother. He didn’t have time for hunting anymore. Never really had time for it, to be fair, but Kili always convinced him to drop everything and come with him, and to Mordor with consequences. No one could be really be mad at them if them came back with a nice deer that would feed them for days, could they?

There must have been so many rabbits around the mountain, Kili would have been out hunting every other day, and he’d have dragged Fili with him at least once a week. Dis and Thorin would have complained, but they would have listened to the stories of their little trips on the surface with a fond smile. They’d have been _happy_ , all of them.

Ori wasn’t shaking anymore, and barely rocking at all, and they’d been out for far more than five minutes, but neither of them moved to go back inside. As long as they were on that balcony, Fili could pretend that his brother was waiting for him inside, ready to tease him for leaving like that. Except Kili wouldn’t have left him alone with Ori that long, would he? He would have rushed to the boy’s rescue in a matter of seconds, to make sure that his brother wasn’t threatening again his tiny, emotionless boyfriend.

“Thank you,” Ori said after a while. It was probably the first time he’d actually talked to Fili since the night when he’d begged for help.

“What even was the matter with you?” Fili grunted. “You were doing pretty well, why did you get all nervous like that?”

“Noise,” Ori explained with a vague gesture. “Smells. I’m too sensitive. Need to drink water, or I’ll get a headache. Bit of a wimp.”

Fili hated the way Ori smiled then, as if he’d tried to say a joke but wasn’t sure how funny it was. Like a kid repeating something he’d heard grown-ups say.

“If you’re a wimp then so’s Thorin,” the prince said. “Can’t stand noise either, and he’s always exhausted after parties.”

“Sorry. Didn’t want to insult him.”

Ori was rocking again, but Fili just shrugged. He knew Ori hadn’t been trying to insult anyone but himself. What he didn’t know was why he was trying to talk that boy. Not just talk to him, but comfort him. It was the night air, he decided, and the stars. Kili and him had always loved stars. Maybe the ghost of his brother had come to watch them with him again, and was forcing him to be nice.

It sounded like something Kili would do.

“Let’s go back inside,” Fili sighed. “Everyone must be looking for us.”

Dis looked relieved when they came back into the room, though not as much as Dori and Ari. Nori, who until then must have lurked in the shadows, was with them, and ze glared at Fili when the boys appeared together.

“It was my fault,” Ori told them, looking down at his feet. “I wasn’t feeling well because of the party, and Fili took me somewhere quiet until I was better. Sorry. It was like granddad’s birthday.”

Instantly, the boy’s mother and his siblings all relaxed, and took him away to make him drink and eat.

“You should have warned me,” Dis scolded him when they were alone. “I was worried!”

“I didn’t mean to be gone so long. I guess I needed the quiet too. Look, he’s fine, isn’t he? And, well, now you know. He needs time off when he’s around people, or something like that. Bit like uncle, only instead of getting grumpy, he’s more the sort to faint.”

“I didn’t know.”

“You do now.”

The princess did not appreciate her son’s attitude, and she was probably about to say it, but Fili just left to chat with someone else. There would be a lecture sometime later, about how princes talked to their elders, about making sure Dis had all the information she needed to handle a situation, but that would be later. Right at that moment, Fili couldn’t deal with that. He missed Kili too much, missed him like a drowning dwarf missed air, like a caged bird missed flying. So he threw himself into mindless conversations, thanking people who congratulated him for his pretty little husband, for the baby, for how well Erebor was doing. It was the same things, repeated again and again and again until Fili could almost answer without listening to what was said, and it helped him forget a little that he was now alone. Would always be alone.

  


In the end, Dis never lectured him. Instead, she just came to his office and asked him to tell her everything he knew about Ori’s needs that could help her make him feel comfortable. The question made him laugh at first, before making him angry.

“Why don’t you just ask him? He should know better than me, don’t you think?”

“He is shy around me, and doesn’t want to be a bother. I have asked him already, and that’s all I could get out of him. But you knew he was unwell last night…”

Fili shrugged and pretended to arrange the papers on his desk.

“He’s always unwell, that’s about all you need to know.”

“Fili!”

“What! It’s true! Why don’t you go ask Dori or Nori, they can tell you more than me! Why do you keep pestering me about him?”

“Because he is carrying your child!” Dis exploded. “Because he was your brother’s friend, because you fought by his side more than once, because you are going to marry him, because you will raise a child together! You are the one who said you would marry him! The baby wouldn’t have been the first bastard spawned by the line of Durin, but you chose to claim it, now _deal with the consequences_!”

“You can’t _make_ me care about Ori!” Fili snarled. “Trust me, Kili tried before you. I hate him. He’s small, he’s weak, he’s pathetic, he can barely speak without panicking, and he probably hates me too, so I don’t see why I should…”

“He doesn’t hate you,” Dis cut him dryly. “Not that the rest is true either, but he certainly doesn’t hate you. He wouldn’t have told you about the child if he’d hated you. With a family like his, do you think he would have risked having his baby fall into the hands of a bad father?”

But Ori hadn’t wanted Fili to raise the child, he had just come to ask for help… but why ask him? Even if he hadn’t felt safe around Dori, who lived with their mother and her husband, there was still Nori. But he’d asked Fili, of all people.

“Maybe he trusts me then. Doesn’t mean he doesn’t hate me. Look at uncle and Bard.”

“My gem, if you think that Thorin and Bard trust each other, then you know nothing. And you said Ori had come to you right after finding out he was with child, right? He probably didn’t even think about it, poor boy. Just ran to whoever he felt would make his baby safe. And that was you.”

Fili nodded, because he felt it was expected of him, but he wondered. It was unlikely that Ori would ever have felt safe anywhere near him, but maybe he’d ran his way that day because for a moment, he’d forgotten that Kili was dead. It was the sort of thing he’d do.

It was the sort of things Fili had done sometimes, in the first few weeks.

“I still hate him,” the prince sullenly said. “You can’t make me not hate him.”

“Fine,” Dis sighed. “But you care about the child, yes?”

“Of course!”

“Then consider this: if we want the child to be well, we have to make sure that Ori is well. Stress is bad for anyone bearing, and since he is so young, we have to be even more careful. Now, for the good of your child, can you tell me what I should do to make him feel at ease? I will ask his family too, but I want your opinion first.”

A trick to make him cooperate.

It worked, of course. Fili rarely won their fights. So he tried to recall everything he’d seen, everything that Kili had told him.

“He can’t be around people for long, but you know that already. He’s very sensitive to noise… and smells, he said last night. He likes to know what to expect of any situation, so you’ve got to, well, tell him about the sort of people there are and the sort of things that will happen. Kili… Kili always did that when he took him out to festivals. I think there’s something about making sure he eats and drinks regularly. There’s probably more, but I never bothered remembering it. He’s never been my problem before.”

“He is now, but only if you chose to think of him as a problem.”

“What else could he be?”

“How about a friend? Mahal help us, I know you’ve decided that he’s worse than an orc, but it would mean so much to me if you tried. Please try. For the child’s sake.”

“I promise I’ll try,” Fili lied.

Or at least, he supposed it was a lie. He’d never meant to even tolerate Ori, but that moment on the balcony had been… nice. Quiet. It had been a long while since he’d had a moment of quiet with anyone. Everyone who came near him these day had something to demand or ask. Maybe Ori did too, but since he couldn’t voice it, he was still an improvement over most people at the moment.

Maybe he would try to tolerate Ori then.

But only if the boy made efforts to stop being so annoying.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> okay, so, I've got news, good and bad  
> good news: I've got the next two chapters written, and I have the start of chapter 8 too! so, for now, it doesn't look like I'm going to drop this fic as I've been known to do in the past  
> bad news: I'll be abroad for a week starting tomorrow, so I don't know if I'll be able to post these chapters. Even if I can, I seriously doubt I'll be able to write more chapters. (if I write, it'd probably be on paper)  
> but, yeah. I'm not abandoning this fic. I have plans for the boys.


	6. dance lesson

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Ori and Fili try to learn how to dance, and end up having a conversation

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warning for ableism from Fili

Their engagement was to last only one month, to make sure that the baby was born after the wedding. It was not a very pleasant month for Fili. There was a lot to organize, and even if his mother was taking care of most things, there was still work for him. People to contact, invitations to sign, excuses to be sent to people living too far away to be invited, a ceremony tunic to be measured for, and training to dance with Ori.

And that was a problem of course. Ori, _supposedly_ , could dance. He had told Dis that he could, and Fili had heard Kili talk about the two of them dancing. But here in their drawing-room, in front of Fili, he became paralyzed and could barely move his feet. Not that Fili was better off. Once, long ago, Kili had joked that Fili had learned the violin just so he’d have a good excuse not to dance. He hadn’t been entirely wrong.

So there they were, the two of them supposed to have the first dance at their wedding, and they couldn’t make a move without stepping on each other’s toes.

“It’s your fault for not moving properly!” Fili eventually exploded two days before the wedding. “Look at you, I’ve seen _asses_ who could follow instructions better than that! If you can’t dance, we’ll just have to forget that damn tradition because I’m not making a fool of myself in front of the kingdom because of you!”

“Fili, careful,” his mother said warningly.

Fili ignored her. He had barely slept in days, trying to make sure everything was ready for the ceremony, that he knew the rituals words, and that was on top of his regular duties, and they had been trying to get that simple, _short_ dance right for hours, without any progress. Part of it was his fault, because he couldn’t dance to save his life, but most of it was Ori’s fault, because they wouldn’t be in that situation if the damn boy hadn't seduced Kili.

“What? It’s the truth. He’s an _idiot_. Can only hope the baby won’t be as stupid as him, because Mahal help us if someone like that ever gets on the throne. M’al, Ori, but if the kid is like you, I’ll just…”

“You won’t be doing _anything_ to my baby,” Ori hissed, stepping back toward the door of his bedroom, with his arms curled around his stomach. “If… if it’s a problem that it might be like me, I… I’m calling this _off_ ! I’d… I’d rather try my chance with my _father_ if you might hurt the baby, because… because… because against my father, I _can_ get people to protect us!”

Ori looked so tiny and delicate, in his pretty purple tunic, and his stomach that curved in that way it only did for dwarves bearing, every bit the pretty little spouse of a noble. Only, he was standing like a warrior ready to fight, feet firmly on the ground, fists tight and eyes glaring at Fili. Last time the prince had seen Ori like that had been before the battle of the five armies. And the boy had come out of it with nothing but a few scratches, he suddenly remembered, even though Dwalin and a few others said he’d fought as hard as anyone.

If it came to a fight, Fili realized, he couldn’t win against Ori. Even angry and tired, he was thinking clearly enough to know that he didn’t really want to hurt the boy and his child, but Ori would be fighting to protect his baby. The only thing he had left of Kili.

Ori could probably _kill_ for that child.

“I think that quite enough for today,” Dis chirped with forced cheerfulness. “We are all tired, let’s try again tomorrow. Let’s go have dinner together Ori, hm?”

Ori shrugged, still glaring at Fili as if he were a monster as dangerous as the ones they’d met on the road.

Which he was, the prince realized, and the thought made him sick. He had promised he would protect the child. He had promised it to himself, to Kili’s memory, to Nori, to everyone… but the child wasn’t even born yet, and he was already behaving as bad as Naren. And that was not acceptable. That was _not_ who he was, who he wanted to be.

“Mother, do you mind if I talk to Ori alone for a moment?”

“I do mind indeed. I think you’ve said enough for today. Go to bed, and think hard about what you’ve just said.”

“I _have_ thought about it!” Fili growled, before taking a deep breath and turning toward Ori. “Please, can we talk alone for a second? I won’t shout, I won’t say anything mean. I swear it on Kili’s grave, I just… I think we need to talk.”

The boy hesitated, but not for long. They knew this about each other at least, that neither of them would use Kili’s name lightly. So Ori nodded, and made himself smile at Dis.

“I’ll be fine,” he said. “I’ll join you for dinner after.”

“Very well. There’s guards at the door, of course. If either of you needs anything, just shout.”

Fili tried not to be hurt that his own mother trusted him so little. When she closed the door behind her, he wondered if she stayed there, trying to listen to them through the thick metal, ready to burst in if Ori seemed in danger.

“I _can_ dance,” Ori said, startling Fili. “I just can’t dance with _you_ , or anyone else. I… I only dance with _Kili_.”

“You could pretend I’m him,” Fili suggested. It was not what they needed to talk about right then, but maybe if they could settle this problem, the rest would be easier.

“I can’t do that. He doesn’t dance like you at all.”

“No, not really. For one thing, _he_ could actually dance.”

It was meant to be a joke, a sort of peace offering. That sort of things had always worked with Kili, and it usually did the trick with Dis and Thorin too. But Ori just shrugged, and went to sit on a chair, still holding his belly.

“I wouldn’t hurt the child,” Fili said, looking away. “Even if it is like you. I shouldn’t have said that I would, and I _swear_ I didn’t mean it. I will take care of that baby. Even if it’s born blind and mute and without legs and arms, I will take care of it and do everything in my power to make sure it’s happy.”

“You can’t insult it,” Ori said, not looking at Fili. “If you insult it, I will _kill_ you.”

Two hours before, that would have made Fili laugh. But at that moment, he knew that Ori meant it. He knew also that should Ori fail, Nori or Dori would manage it.

And finally, he knew that even without that threat, he would _not_ be insulting the child ever. He would not turn into Ori’s father. Fili was not the sort of dwarf who attacked people just because they were too weak to defend themselves, and if he was, then he would change because that was not the sort of person he _wanted_ to be.

“As I’ve said, I’ll do everything I can to make sure that kid’s happy, and insulting him wouldn’t really work with that, right? And I… Look, this isn’t easy for me, but I’ll try to be nicer to you now, okay?”

“It’s not easy for me either. I’ve never been mean to you, though.”

“Maybe,” Fili hissed, fighting not to shout, “but I was Kili’s One and you were _not_ . I had his name written on my skin, I still have his name written, and you don’t. And I was there _first_ ! I was supposed to be _enough_. I had a right to his affection and _you_ did not! We were not lovers, we didn’t want to be lovers, but he still wasn’t supposed to just go and fuck someone else. So however bad you think this is for you, it was _worse_ for me.”

Ori did not answer. He didn’t look so angry anymore, but he hadn’t slipped back into his usual emotionless mask either. Instead, he seemed to be fighting tears as he absently rubbed his right wrist, and for the second time that afternoon, Fili found himself thinking hard.

He’d always believed that having Kili’s name on his wrist meant that he was the most hurt by the situation. He had been _betrayed_ after all. But maybe, just maybe, it might have been hard for Ori too. Knowing that he was in love with someone who already had a soulmate. Someone who, without the security of a fated link, might have left him at any moment. Fili didn’t even understand how anyone could take such a risk. He would never be able to love someone whose name he didn’t bear.

“That was mean,” Fili sighed. “I shouldn’t have said that. I’ll try to keep my calm in the future. You’re… right, you’ve never been mean to me. I don’t know how you did it.”

“Kili said you were nice.”

For one second Ori managed to look at the prince, and there was something _challenging_ on his usually blank face.

“Not really the word I’d use for myself,” Fili admitted. “I mean, not just with you, but in general too… Kili was the nice one. I’m the responsible and boring one. And the mean one, apparently.”

“Sometimes you’re nice,” Ori replied. “At the party.”

Did that really count as nice though, Fili wasn’t sure. It had been selfishness that had made him help Ori. Fear of shame if the boy should collapse in public, and then, on the balcony, he’d felt too good to want to go back. That probably didn’t count as niceness. He couldn’t be nice without Kili to keep him in check, to call him out when he got nasty.

“I miss Kili,” he just said, almost sobbed. “He was the nice one, and I _miss_ him.”

Without a word, Ori rose from his chair and walked to his room. Fili wondered if his self pitying had finally been too much for the other dwarf. But before long, Ori was back, holding a piece of paper which he gave to Fili.

A portrait of Kili, smiling and smoking, so well drawn that Fili could almost hear his brother’s laugh. It must have been made during the quest, judging by Kili’s clothes. And there was a bruise on the dark haired prince cheek, just like…

“You drew this the night after I fell in the river, didn’t you?” Fili gasped.

“I drew this the night after he saved you,” Ori corrected, as if it made a difference.

They’d been crossing a river, shortly after leaving the Shire, and Fili’s pony had gotten scared suddenly, making him fall. Fili had hit his head against a rock, and if Kili hadn’t been there…

“He loved you,” Ori whispered, as if Fili didn’t _know_ that already.

But after all that had happened, maybe it was nice to be reminded. Kili had betrayed him, and taken a lover, but it didn’t mean he’d ever stopped loving Fili, nor that he’d loved him less. If people could have their One for lover and still have close friends… if some people had more than one name written on their skin, and could love all the people bearing these names…

He’d been jealous of Ori for so long, he’d never really taken the time to wonder whether he should be.

“He loved you too,” Fili said.

Ori stared at him, his eyebrows so high that it was almost comical to look at. Fili didn’t laugh though. The words had hurt as he said them, but he couldn’t go on pretending for ever. Kili had loved Ori, whether Fili liked it or not. Kili had loved that boy, but not the way he had loved Fili, and it had been so childish of him to think that with Ori in the picture, he might lose his brother’s affection. Kili wasn’t so shallow. Kili was the good one.

Neither of them really knew what to say after that, but Fili didn’t mind the silence. Liked it, even. Everything else was constantly noisy, but Ori was quiet. Just like on the balcony that night, Fili didn’t want to go, enjoying the chance to just _be_. If it might not have made his mother think he’d murdered his fiancé, Fili would have stayed there forever.

“You should probably go have dinner,” the prince eventually sighed, handing back the drawing to Ori. “Mother will be worried.”

“Keep it,” Ori said, pushing away Fili’s hand. “It’s for you.”

“Really?”

The younger dwarf nodded and looked away.

“I have others.”

“Thank you,” Fili said, hoping the other dwarf would see he was sincerely grateful. “I’m… You’re… I always thought you were the worst person in the world, but you’re… you’re a lot better than I ever thought you were.”

It wasn’t an apology, Fili knew it. It wasn’t even quite a compliment either.

But it must still have been enough, because Ori smiled at him. His first sincere smile in weeks… probably in months.

And it gave the prince hope. There would be other bad days, and other fights, but maybe they would figure out how to live with each other in the end.

 


	7. the wedding

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> the boys get married

Nothing went wrong at the wedding. Hours of training paid off for Ori would remained calm for the entire ceremony, though he had to rush to the bathroom between that and the feast. Growing a baby, Fili was told, made you want to pee very, very frequently. There was something of a warning in Dis’s tone as she explained that, as if she feared her son would use that fact to mock his fiancé… his _husband_ now. Fili felt a little offended by her distrust, though he supposed she couldn’t be blamed for not knowing he’d promised himself to make real efforts now. But she would see. They would all see. He would not be like Naren.

The feast was _nice_. It wasn’t as grandiose as those that must have happened for royal weddings of old, because Erebor was still just rebuilding and they still had to be careful about food, but everyone had fun. Even Fili managed to enjoy himself, and so did Ori, devouring roasted mushroom and chips.

There was a little awkwardness when the time to dance came, but even that went a lot easier than during their training sessions. Somehow, Ori ended up leading, and even though it wasn’t what they had prepared for, it was a lot easier that way. Fili only stepped on his husband’s toes a couple times, and afterward people seemed to have found it cute.

“My wife couldn’t walk for three days after our wedding,” Gloin told Fili when ze’d had a little too much to drink. “Turned out, I had broken one of her toes.”

Ze laughed then, and hir wife laughed too, so Fili joined them (little Gimli didn’t laugh however, being at that age when parents could not be anything but an embarrassment)(Fili wondered if the baby would be like that one day)(he wondered, too, when they were supposed to find it a name. They only had two more months before the birth, maybe they would have to talk about it soon).

It was a nice day, except for the end.

 

Fili, in all honesty, hadn’t thought they’d be forced to go through all the usual wedding traditions. Dancing the first dance had been bad enough, and he felt that no one should have asked more from him. He was sorely disappointed when he was still forced to share a cup of wine with Ori (for happiness in love, Bofur told him, and wasn’t that ridiculous when wine tended to break marriages rather than bring people together) and when some hours after nightfall, his husband and him had to feed each other a grape. For _fertility_ , of all things.

“It’s not exactly like we’re going to need it, right?” Fili tried to protest, pointing at Ori’s stomach.

“Children need siblings,” Bombur pointed out, pushing the plate of grape his way. “Can’t have the little one growing alone, can we?”

“And it’s tradition,” Balin added with that infuriating smile of his. “As a prince, you must…”

“Yes, yes, as a prince I must make a fool of myself to please people, I know. Fine, as you please. Ori, are you ready?”

The boy nodded quietly, and grabbed a grape that he pressed against Fili’s lips. The prince opened his mouth and clumsily ate the fruit, his lips closing around Ori’s fingers before the boy could remove them. Heat came to Fili’s cheeks, the intimacy of the gesture getting to him more than he would have liked. When it was his turn to feed Ori, he was careful not to touch the other dwarf’s lips. There was a round of applause then, until a young dwarf Fili didn’t really know stood up, looking like someone who thought ze’d had a clever idea.

“I say it’s time to put the princes to bed,” ze exclaimed, and there was a roar of approbation.

“There is no public bedding planned tonight,” Thorin replied sternly. “It has been said more than once.”

The young dwarf (who sat at the same table as Naren and Nern, Fili later rememember) must have had too much to drink already, because that only made him laugh.

“Come on majesty, what’s a wedding without a bedding? And how often does a prince and a hero wed?”

The older guests kept quiet, but all the younger ones shouted their approval of the idea. Fili couldn’t fully blame them. Kili and him had been in their place sometimes, in Ered Luin, laughing at relatives who tried to protect the newlyweds from a public beddings. He remembered thinking that people who did that just had no sense of fun, and if it had only been him, he would had given in immediately. Beddings were fun enough usually, if a little rough and crude. But he knew Ori would not see the fun in it, and after already an entire day surrounded by people, and after Dis had promised him that it would not happen…

Thorin looked at Fili to silently ask if he should use his authority to forbid the bedding, and the prince in turn looked at Ori. The boy was staring down at his plate, hands clenched on the sides of his tunic, a little more relaxed than he had when they’d taken him away from his father’s house, but barely.

“We won’t let them,” Fili promised, even if part of him regretted the lost occasion for a good laugh. “Don’t worry, Thorin will tell them, and…”

“No,” Ori said calmly, not taking his eyes away from his plate. “Too late now. We have to do it.” He sighed, which came out as a half sob. “I’ve been at weddings too. If we really say no, they’ll resent it. Bad image for you.”

“We can use the baby as an excuse you know,” Fili suggested, but the other dwarf just shook his head.

“No. I’ll do it. I _can_ do it.”

Fili hesitated before turning toward his uncle and nodding. Ori should not have had to go through that, they had _promised_ him…

But before Fili could apologise, Thorin announced that the bedding would happen, and two dozens young people springed from their seats and rushed to the newlyweds to drag them out of the great hall where they were feasting. The last Fili saw of Ori before they were separated was that Nori had inserted himself in the group that surrounded his brother. He wouldn’t allow the teasing go too far, which meant that Fili could enjoy his own half of the bedding without worrying.

 

They had made a crown of golden little penises for Fili to wear to bed, and the prince laughed so hard that he cried. This was so much more awful than anything Kili and him and ever done, and they’d been rather nasty to the grooms sometimes. For a brief second, the prince wondered if Ori had to deal with anything that crude too, but then someone started explaining to him the entire meaning behind his crown, and he was once again laughing too much to care about anything.

The jokes weren’t even all that funny, but it had been too long since anyone had really teased him, and he would have laughed at less than that, just for the sake of laughing.

The laughing stopped, however, when the other group brought Ori inside the room.

They had made Ori pretty.

Fili had always known that the boy was nice to look at. Even with his furious attempts to deny that Ori had any qualities, he’d never had a choice about that one. Ori was pretty, even if he was dressed like a sick sheep, even if his hair looked like a sparrow’s nest, even if his face was so inexpressive. But now he was wearing a translucent robe that hinted at a pleasant roundness, his hair was still in the beautiful braids that Dis had made for the wedding, and Nori must have said something funny, because Ori was smiling at him, a slight blush on his cheeks.

And just like that, Fili found himself thinking that Kili couldn’t really be blamed for falling in love.

That thought left as quickly as it had come, and then the prince forgot it for a long time, because everyone was pushing him into bed, people laughing and reminding him that he had to be careful if he took Ori, and to mind the baby. They were a lot more careful about getting Ori into the bed, pushing Fili aside to make space, and helping his young husband to climb on the mattress. There were a few more jokes after that, but they no longer made Fili laugh, though he wasn’t sure why. It might been because of the way Nori was glaring at him, or because Ori was sitting so close he could feel the warmth of his skin.

Whatever it was, Fili only went back to normal when the door was closed behind the last jester, and Ori slumped inelegantly against a pillow, starting to undo his braids. After being tied so tight for so long, his hair was sticking up in every direction, and he didn’t look so pretty anymore, which was a relief.

“Well, that could have been worse,” Fili sighed, removing the penis crown and inspecting it. Kili would have died from laughter if he’d seen something like that. “Maybe I should keep it. Wear it in councils, just to see how many old nobles get a heart attack.”

Kili would have laughed, and he would have forced him to really do it one day. Fili tried to not be disappointed when the joke fell flat. He turned to tell Ori that he intended to sleep in the ground, and froze. The boy’s face was scrunched up in pain and was breathing loudly as he rubbed his stomach with one hand.

“Are you okay?” Fili asked. “Should I call mother?”

In his limited knowledge of pregnancies, pain meant that the baby was coming. Seven months was very early, but it happened sometimes, and Ori was so young, and anything could go wrong, and they shouldn’t have made him go through a public bedding, not in his state, and…

“It’s fine,” Ori hissed. “Baby moving.”

That did nothing to calm Fili. He knew that babies moved inside their bearers, he remembered Dis showing it to him when she was bearing Kili, but he’d never heard of it being _painful_.

“I think I should get my mother,” he decided. “And maybe Oin, too.”

The prince tried to leave the bed, but Ori grabbed his arm to stop him. Fili instantly stopped moving, for fear of hurting the boy more than that, and because if Ori was touching anyone, it had to be important.

“Oin knows,” he just said between clenched teeth. “Happens. Just wait.”

Since Ori’s hand was still clenched on his arm, Fili had no choice but to obey. After a few minutes of Ori rubbing his stomach, he relaxed a little, and let go of the prince.

“What was that?” Fili asked. “Is that _normal_?”

“Happens,” Ori repeated tiredly. “Oin knows.”

He yawned, and touched his stomach again, smiling now. Now that he wasn’t so worried, Fili could see something moving sometimes under Ori’s skin. He couldn’t decide if it was disgusting or touching. Right then, after seeing Ori in pain, disgust was winning.

“Want to touch?” Ori asked sleepily.

“You hate being touched,” Fili retorted, a little sick at the idea that there was a living thing inside the other dwarf.

Ori shrugged. “Everyone touches anyway. They want to feel it kick.”

“Then I’ll be the better person for once, and leave you and your baby alone. You’re allowed to tell them to leave you alone, you know. Well, obviously you’re allowed. But you _should_ really stand for yourself a little more. Do you hear me?”

Ori didn’t answer. He had fallen asleep already. Fili couldn’t really blame him for it, it had been a long day.

Carefully, the prince left the bed, taking one pillow with him. The floor wasn’t the most comfortable place to sleep on, but then again, he’d slept on worse. And he felt certain either Dis or Nori would come wake them up in the morning, and they would appreciate seeing that Fili was in no way taking advantage of the situation.

 


	8. violin

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Fili takes up again an old hobby

The first thing Fili did in the morning, after being woken up by his mother  _ and  _ Nori, was to go see Oin and check if Ori had really told him about his pain. He half hoped for a negative answer, and for the healer to say that there was just some herb to be taken in hot water to make everything better, but he was disappointed.

“Just ‘cause your mother had an easy time with your brother doesn’t mean everyone does,” Oin explained. “And with little Ori being such a nervous mess, it makes everything difficult for him. And he’s young. You should wait a few years before giving siblings to that babe, or be the one to bear them.”

“But Ori and the baby will be fine, right?”

“ Don’t see why not. The Ris, they’ve never had trouble having their children. It’s as easy for them as a hen laying a hen. A  _ pretty  _ hen. Can’t do anything for the pain though. Some babes are restless, we can’t do anything about it, just wait till they’re born. Ask Gloin how he liked bearing Gimli, and you’ll see your Ori isn’t having it so bad.”

Except Ori wasn’t his, Fili almost protested. He thought better of it in the end. They hadn’t been married for a full day yet, he still had to look like he loved the boy. He didn’t really hope to fool anyone from the Company, but he had to stay in character.

The rest of the day was hardly better. Everyone kept congratulating Fili and winking at him while hinting things about the wedding night, or even wondering why he wasn’t still in bed with his young husband. Even Thorin seemed to be surprised to see him in council that morning and Fili realized, but too late, that he could have taken the day off quite easily if he had wanted. 

Ori certainly had. After Dis and Nori had come to bring breakfast and chat a little, Nori had helped his brother move to his own bedroom, where the boy apparently spent the day. When Dis told him about it, Fili felt a little irritated, both because he hadn’t thought of grabbing this chance of rest, and because no matter what Oin and Ori had said, he was worried about the boy’s pains.

After all, he told himself, if Ori lost the child, everything they had done would have been for nothing, and he’d be stuck for the rest of his life with a husband he could barely tolerate.

He tried to not think about the option of losing both the child and Ori. That idea made him feel sick and he couldn’t bear it.

 

* * *

 

But Ori’s health remained good in the following weeks. Or so Fili was told. With the emergency of the wedding behind, Fili was no longer required by his mother to assist to Ori’s lessons. It gave him more time to deal with his regular duties, which meant he was no longer so constantly stressed and tired. As a result, it was easier to be… if not nice, then at least  _ decent  _ around Ori. They usually only met at dinner, and even then, Ori ate with his mother-in-law more frequently than with his husband.

When they did spend the night together, they rarely spoke much. Fili had tried to at first, because it seemed to him that married people were supposed to have conversations. But Ori was usually too exhausted by constant interactions during the day to reply, and to be perfectly frank, Fili didn’t mind. Most of the time, they ate quickly and then retreated to their respective rooms. The first two weeks, Fili just used that time off to sleep more than usual.

Then it hit him one day that this was rather a waste of a time window that he could be using to play the violin.

Much as he loved music, Fili had not touched once his violin since his mother had brought it with her. He had been busy, he had been tired, he had found a thousand excuses not to do it. The truth was that, just like many other things he no longer did, it would have reminded him too much of Kili. They had learned together and often played together, and the idea of doing it alone now was… 

But he couldn’t always live in the past. Kili wouldn’t ever come back to play with him, so he had to move on. His brother wouldn’t have wanted him to give up on everything they used to do together. M’al, but Kili would rather have pestered him to do them again on his own. He had always been good at pestering people… so good that even just the memory of him could still make Fili do anything.

The first night, Fili did little more than to tune his violin, and check that it had not suffered from the trip. He tried to play a few notes too, to make sure he still could, but all the songs he could remember were Kili’s favourites, and that was more than he could bear at the moment. The violin went back to it case.

It stayed there for a week before Fili gave it another go. He planned ahead this time, and played something that Kili and him had rarely played. It was a lullaby of some sort, or maybe an old ballad. Something Dwalin liked to play, but for which they’d never known the words. It was easy,  the melody was short and could be repeated endlessly, which Fili did. He continued playing far into the night, long after he should have gone to sleep. It might have been the song itself, or just the pleasure of making music again but the prince was reluctant to stop. He slept little that night, but at least he slept well.

Fili started playing almost every night after that. Sometimes he couldn’t manage to do it for more than a few minutes before he got tired. On a good evening, he could play for an hour or two. At first he dared not play anything except that little song, but slowly he started daring to play things that reminded him of Kili.

If he closed his eyes, Fili could almost pretend that his brother was back with him. Some night he imagined Kili dancing, reckless even then, seeming to fly almost as he moved to the music. At other times, he thought of Kili playing with him, their violins singing as one to some joyous tune. Or when Fili was in a melancholic mood, he played alone while his brother listened. He used to make Kili cry sometimes, if he chose the songs well, and when he missed his brother the most, Fili played music that would have broken Kili’s heart like his own now was. He hoped that Kili’s soul could hear it, wherever he was, so they could cry together.

 

* * *

 

It was after such a night that Fili found Ori asleep in their drawing room, curled up in a chair by the prince’s door. He was more than eight months into his pregnancy at that point, but he looked so young and innocent in his sleep that Fili almost sick, looking as the roundness of his stomach. Ori was too young for this, too young to bear a child, too young to be married, too young to be mourning a lover. Ori was too young, and so was Fili, probably, and Kili… Kili had been far too young to die.

In his chair, Ori shifted a little. Not awake, but getting there.

Fili’s old annoyance started coming back to him, seeing Ori so fragile and  _ foolish _ . Because only a fool could fall asleep in a chair when pregnant. Fili wanted to shake Ori awake, and he wanted to try to carry him back to his bed to tuck him under a cover, as would be much better for the baby, and for Ori’s back. Before he could decide which option he liked better, Ori opened his eyes.

He froze when he saw Fili, a look of pure horror on his face.

“Time?”

“ It’s early morning. Don’t know if that’s good or bad news for you. How did you even fall asleep  _ here _ ?”

Ori looked down, as if the floor might help him find a decent reason for what he had done.

“Violin,” he eventually mumbled. “I like it. You play well.”

“ I don’t play it for  _ you _ !” Fili snarled.

It had been a while since he’d lost his calm at Ori, but this was not okay. He played the violin because of Kili, for Kili. After all the times he’d been forced to share his One with Ori, he just wanted to have this for himself, just that little thing, something that would be for the two of them only, something…

“ Makes the baby kick less,” Ori whispered, and if his voice was soft, there was an air of absolute determination on his face. “I can’t  _ sleep _ . It kicks  _ all the night _ . But  _ not  _ if we listen to you.”

“But I don’t play for you,” Fili repeated stubbornly, even if the fight was lost already. “Can’t you get someone else to play for you?”

“ Don’t know anyone. Please, I  _ need  _ to sleep.”

It wasn’t fair of Ori to use the baby like that. But Fili knew it also wasn’t fair of him to even  _ think  _ that Ori was doing that on purpose, when he could see the shadows under his young husband’s eyes, not when Ori had fallen asleep fully dressed in a chair, and had been quieter than ever when they ate together these last few days…

“If we do this, we do it properly,” Fili grunted. “No more sleeping in a chair, you hear me? It’ll kill your back, and that would be bad for everyone. I’ll come play for you in your room tonight, okay?”

Ori nodded sleepily, and Fili sighed in annoyance.

“Look at you, you didn’t get any rest like that! Let’s get you in your room, to get some real rest. I swear, why didn’t just ask me?”

“ You got  _ angry _ .”

Fili looked away for a moment, his cheek heating up in shame. He was trying to be nicer, but instead he kept proving that he was not safe for Ori. What sort of a person got angry because someone was listening to them when they played music?

“Let’s get you to bed,” Fili mumbled, helping Ori to his feet, and held out his arm for the boy to lean on. Much to his surprise, Ori did exactly that, and they walked together to his bedroom. Fili helped his husband get into bed, and Ori fell asleep almost immediately.

 

* * *

 

“Have you thought about names for the baby?” Fili asked that night.

Ori was making himself comfortable in his bed, trying to find a position that was good both for him and the baby, and the question had hit Fili. The prince couldn’t get his eyes away from the other dwarf’s stomach. Just a few more weeks now. Two, maybe three. And then he’d be a father. They would be fathers. It made Fili sick with terror, and half mad with excitement.

“You name it,” Ori muttered, nervously twisting his blanket with his fingers. “I have no right. But, just. Not Kili, please?”

That would have been a terrible idea indeed, so Fili nodded. He knew that some people had suggested it, but he couldn’t bear it. Even if he was going to raise that child because of Kili, for Kili, he didn’t want the baby to ever think it was some sort of replacement. But at the same time, it would feel right to honour Kili while name his child.

“What would you say to Kis?” Fili suggested. “It’s not Kili, but it could be our way to acknowledge that the child is his, and… mother would be pleased I think, because, well. Dis, Kis… what do you say?”

Ori just shrugged and nodded, as if it didn’t concern him.

“If you’d like to have something of your name in it too…”

“Your child, not mine,” Ori murmured. “You choose the name. Kis is fine.”

The boy looked so exhausted that Fili decided not to insist, but he was shocked. Ori  _ adored  _ his baby, even if it didn’t let him sleep and caused him frequent pain. He had knitted and crocheted things for it, even though he could easily afford to buy anything that crossed his mind, even though Dis kept him busy with lessons of all sorts. Ori loved the child, and he should have been more concerned about choosing its outer name, and…

“Play, please?” Ori asked with a grimace. “Kickin.”

Fili took his violin, and started playing. There would be time for questions later. All that mattered at that moment was to help Kili’s lover and his child to sleep.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> not feeling too sure about that chapter, but... yeah. there we go.  
> Also last chapter I had readyy in advance, so nothing more until this weekend I think


	9. Kis

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> the baby is coming at last

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I need to go back to the older chapters and make sure that I wrote nothing that went against this (and to correct it if needed) but while writing this fic, I've started headcanoning that Thror's descendants were dark-skinned. Because why not.

There was a knock on the door of the council room, and Dis came in.

“I just wanted to warn my son that Ori has gone into labour,” she said. “You are not needed _right now_ , but it would probably be good if you join us when you are done here. Do you know where the birthing room of the palace is?”

“I will take him there,” Thorin said when his nephew shook his head. “We shall not be much longer.”

When Dis had left, everyone started commenting the news, each dwarf present having a piece of advice or a warning to give about babies and children and how to raise them. Fili heard nothing of it.

Ori was having his baby. Ori was having Kili’s baby. Ori was having _their_ baby. And Fili was going to be a father.

It took Thorin a while to get the council to calm down and get back to the matter they were discussing before the interruption. At least, Fili supposed they went back to business. He was no longer paying attention to any of it. The baby was coming. Fili felt delirious with anticipation and excitement and terror. He'd read a bit  about raising children but he had a feeling that would not be enough to get things right... and he had made the mistake to read about how births went on, and so many things could go wrong, especially with Ori a furkhsulâl. They often had a harder time giving birth, Fili had read, and Ori was so _young_. What if something went very wrong and they lost Ori or Kis or both? What if it went wrong and Fili was asked to make a choice between bearer and child? What if...

"Council is over," Thorin said, putting one hand on his nephew's shoulder. "Let us go see how your husband is doing."

Fili followed his uncle thoughtlessly, still stuck on his grim thoughts. After a moment, Thorin spoke to him again, about some issues in one mine at first. A ploy to force Fili out of his own head, and one that worked.

"How are the things with the boy?" Thorin asked when his nephew had relaxed. "Your mother told me you dine with him frequently?"

"Whenever he's not eating with her. I'm... I'm trying uncle. I try to be decent to him... I play the violin to him at night to calm down the baby and help him sleep. And I'll try to be a good father to the child too, I swear."

"I have no fear for the child," Thorin simply replied.

The accusation stung. Any other day, Fili might have gotten angry, shouted that he was doing his best already. But Ori was having a child, and the prince was more terrified than he would have thought. It made him more honest.

"I don't know what to do," he confessed. "I _promise_ that I'm doing my best, but whenever I look at him I think of Kili, and... I never know what he's thinking about, he's so cold, and... do you think I was right to marry him?"

"You thought it would be best for the child."

Fili sighed. It might as well have been a sob. He knew he was old enough that he had to deal with his own decisions and their consequences, but it made him feel the absence of Kili more than ever. They used to deal with things together, no matter which one of them had made a mistake or decided something. He _would_ have helped Kili deal with the consequences of his frolicking with Ori if his brother had lived, and they would have done this together, but instead was alone in front of everything.

He just wanted to feel supported and loved, the way he had when Kili had been around. Even in their worst arguments, they had still loved each other. Now he only had his mother and uncle, and they thought he was a monster who had abused a child and would do it again at first chance.

"Mother says I should not have married him nor claimed the child."

Thorin stopped, and looked at him with surprise.

"Did she use these exact words?"

"She said I shouldn't have done it if I couldn't deal with the consequences of my actions. And it's pretty clear you all think I can't deal with it."

The king frowned, and Fili closed his eyes, bracing himself for more accusations. Instead, he felt strong arms catch him and pull him close into a hug. Fili did sob this time, against his uncle's shoulder.

"If we really thought you might hurt Ori, he would not share your apartments," Thorin said gently, petting his nephew's hair. "Your mother was unsure sometimes, but I trust you. I know what she doesn't know, and if you had wanted to hurt that boy, you would have done it long ago. I trust you with Ori, I never meant to imply otherwise."

Fili sobbed harder, fighting tears and feeling like a scared, desperate child. It helped knowing that his uncle still trusted him, but this was still nothing like the life he had dreamed of as child.

He must have said that last bit aloud, because Thorin held him tighter.

"Life rarely is what we dreamed of," he whispered. "Growing up is learning this... and learning to adapt your dreams to what life gives you. You cannot have your brother, and Ori cannot have the marriage that your brother told me he promised him. But the two of you might at least find friends in each other. You have a same loss to overcome, and Kili cared for you both. Is that not enough to give him a true chance?"

The prince shrugged. There was sense in that, but there was a new anger rising in him. The idea that Kili might have promised marriage to Ori was unbearable, especially if the fact had been kept from him... but then again, they had had every reason not to trust him with that information, hadn't they? Maybe he had not told his brother enough that he would support even his most stupid decisions if he needed help.

But anger would wait. Later, when he would be alone he would allow himself to be furious. For now there was Ori to mind, and Kis, and his anger would not help them. Fili tore himself from his uncle's arms, and started walking again.

"When did Kili tell you about an engagement?" He still asked, unable to entirely resist his curiosity.

"At the skinchanger's house, though I believe they had decided on it long before that. I think by then, they had finally both realised how real the risk of dying was. Kili wanted me to protect Ori, should he die. I wondered then if they might have been soulmates. The Ris have a reputation for marks that appear late..."

Then Kili had truly kept secrets from his brother. Later, Fili might finally allow himself to be angry at his brother, because offering marriage to that boy and not talking of it to his own One was...

But that would be later.

For now, Fili could not allow himself to care about anything but Ori and Kis.

 

First births took a while. _Hours_. Ori had apparently not mentioned his contractions as soon as they had started, but it had still been pretty early when Dis had noticed he was feeling unwell, and she had warned Fili soon after. It was a long wait, and the prince wished he had brought a book, even if he wasn't sure he could have read it.

Kili would have dealt with this situation much better, his brother was sure of it. Or much worse. He would have pestered everyone to be allowed near Ori, and if that had failed, he would have demanded news all the time. He would have paced the corridor and made a nuisance of himself and been everything a happy future father ought to be. But Fili was more terrified than happy at that point, and still not fully used to his approaching parenthood. He just sat on the chair near the door of the birthing room, and prayed silently to Mahal and his wife to let his husband and child live. He would be good to Ori, he promised them, and he would be good to the baby, and make sure that they both were happy and safe, if only they both lived. He would even try to _like_ Ori, he bargained in a moment of terror, when the door opened and he heard the boy's cries coming from inside. He would do _anything_ , as long as no one died.

It was nearly morning when Kis was born at last, a little girl. Immediately after being cleaned, she was put in Fili's arms by Dis. He might have cried then, but of disappointment.

Kis was blond.

It had never occurred to him that his brother's child might be anything but dark haired. She had to have black hair, she was Kili's, she had to look like him...

"She's your very picture," Dis claimed proudly. "Blonde and dark skinned... but she has Ori's eyes I think. Don't you think she's beautiful?"

"She's perfect," Fili replied with a shaky voice. He had promised to be a good father, and he could not do that by wanting his daughter to be other than how she was. She _was_ perfect because she was his daughter, and Kili's, and...

"How is Ori?" He asked. "Is he well? Will he be okay? Why did you give her to me, shouldn't he be holding her first?"

"Peace, Fili. Your husband is well, if tired. He just insisted you be given the child right now. Let's go see him together and give him your daughter to hold."

Fili obeyed and followed, although he wished his mother had taken Kis again. The child was so tiny in his arm, a little red and wrinkled and looking so fragile that Fili was terrified of hurting her. He held her close and kissed her brow tenderly before giving her to Ori. The boy seemed almost surprised to hold her, but he smiled at their daughter and held her close.

"You did a good job," Fili said, almost certain that he was supposed to say something. "She's wonderful. We'll have to be worthy of her now."

Ori only nodded in answer, looking far too serious, as if he were taking an oath. Fili put it on the account of exhaustion, and on an impulse, he kissed the boy's forehead. It was what Kili would have done, he told himself, and after what he had gone through, Ori deserved some affection, even from the wrong person.


	10. family visit

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Fili tries to get used to being a father

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> warning for character having a meltdown, someone trying on purpose to be upsetting, racism, and for Ori's dad

Having a baby was a lot of work, even with people paid to help you. They had a nurse,Sain, to help them care for Kis, but from what Fili understood, hir job was mostly to take Kis from her room and bring her to Ori if he was sleeping and hadn't heard her. Ze was supposed to bathe the child too, and do a number of small things, but Ori had insisted on doing as much as possible by himself. Dis had agreed to it, at least while Kis was young, because a devoted parent could only be good for the royal family's image. Fili had had some doubts, because he would have liked the nurse to help them more, but in the end he had to trust his mother, and Ori too.

Fili himself had little time for the child. He told himself he was busy being a prince, but the truth was that he was terrified of doing things wrong. Even holding a baby the bad way could hurt them, and what if he dropped her, what if he held her too tight? He was not _made_ to be a father, not like Ori who always seemed to have _everything_ under control. Ori could feed her and change her diapers and hold her. He even sang to her at night to make her sleep, and though Fili wanted to suggest that he might sometimes play the violin for her, he never dared. Ori was so good with their daughter, and caring for her made him look so happy... Fili could not interfere with that.

The child was not his, not _really_ , and he had no rights over her. As long as she was safe, he had no right to disturb her, nor her father.

But that was only as long as she was safe.

And when one evening, little over a month after the birth, Fili entered their drawing room to find Ori having tea with his parents, Kis wasn't safe anymore.

Ari, of course, was perfectly polite. She said all the right things, how Kis was so beautiful and looked so clever already, how she was growing fast. It turned out Ori had seen them once every week, and Fili hadn't known. The prince might have given these two another chance though, for Kis's sake, but Naren's first words ensured that forgiveness was _not_ an option.

"Well," the older dwarf told Fili, "no doubt that she's yours in the end. Little orc looks like someone forgot her in the sun."

It was not the first time Fili had heard the joke. Thror's mother had been a Blacklock, and Fili's own father had had Stonefoot ancestry. It showed. Most people didn't mind, but those who did made Fili's blood boil.

"My... _our_ daughter is not a orc," Fili retorted, looking at Ori for support, in vain. The boy was holding Kis and rocking her slowly in his arms, deaf to his father's insults. It angered Fili, because he _knew_ now that Ori was capable of standing his ground against people as well as monsters, but he did not let it show. He would deal with the boy's cowardice later.

"Master Naren, I am not sure I can allow you or any member of your family near Kis without supervision. It might be normal among your friends to call a baby by such names, but I do not want it to happen to _my_ child. I do not forget either that you accused her father of having little moral and shame, and _that_ cannot be tolerated either. I demand that people respect my husband and my daughter. I must ask you to leave now, and if you, your wife, or anyone else desires to see your son and granddaughter, you will have to request an appointment through me or my mother."

The air of shock and outrage on Naren's face was so glorious it almost erased the pain on Ari's. But she had chosen her husband, whereas Kis had not chosen her grandfather. Fili's choice was easy. Naren cursed and protested, but he still left in the end, a guard taking his wife and him back to the entrance of the palace.

Ori didn't move the whole time, save to rock Kis in his arms, and kiss her forehead once.

"Take her to her room," Fili ordered. "We need to talk, and I'll want you to actually pay attention to me."

He wasn't going to shout, he promised himself as Ori took the baby away. He would stay calm because he _wasn't_ Naren, wasn't a monster who hurt and threatened. But he was still angry at Ori, and for once, there was no little voice in his head telling he was just bitter and jealous. He had a _right_ to be unhappy.

When Ori came back to the drawing room, he was walking slowly, like a dwarf going to their death.

"Sit," Fili asked, only to feel a little cross when Ori promptly obeyed. He wanted _resistance_ ; he wanted Ori to be the boy who had threatened to kill him if he insulted Kis. "I don't want your father to come anywhere near the baby ever again. You can see him if you're ever feeling masochistic, and I don't mind if your mother is around Kis, but that piece of _shit_ who sired you will never come anywhere near my daughter, am I clear?"

Ori nodded silently, looking down at his knees.

"Why did you even let him come near Kis?" Fili insisted, taking the chair next to Ori's. "You came to me to protect her from him, why do you allow him near her now? Didn't you hear what he just said about her? Called her an orc! Why did you let that man near Kis?"

"He's my _father_ ," Ori whispered, sounding as if each word were painful to him.

"Your father who has called you a whore in presence of my mother when I came to ask for your hand. Your father who scares you so much that _I_ felt like a safe person in comparison. What did he tell you to make you agree to this? That being the grandfather gave him rights? Well it _doesn't_. I won't let anyone harm my brother's daughter, certainly not your father, and not even _you_! If you are a danger to her, I _will_ do what I must to protect her!"

It was mean and _cruel_ , but Fili half hoped to make Ori angry again. An angry Ori would not let Naren harm Kis, nor Ori himself hopefully. An angry Ori would not let _anyone_ threaten him, he would _fight_ back.

But this was not an angry Ori day, and the boy just curled up on his chair. It made Fili almost sorry for him. Almost. With Kis's future wellbeing at stake, he could not afford to feel sorry for anyone else. He would not let Naren and his family turn Kis into Ori who was constantly terrified, or even like Nori who attacked everyone to make sure ze was in control of his fights, since ze couldn't imagine a life without fights.

Fili was about to say as much, when Kis started crying. That at least did make Ori react; he sat straighter, as if he wanted to rise from his seat but wasn't sure he had permission.

"Go to her," Fili grunted. "This at least you can do properly, I suppose."

Ori ran toward the nursery, and Fili went to his own room, banging the door behind him. His violin case was on his bed because he had felt like playing that morning. He grabbed the instrument, and played again, pouring all of his anger and frustration into it. It barely was music at all and some notes were almost painful to the ear. But after a while, Fili felt calmer, and his thoughts more organised. He had been _right_ to be furious to see Naren near Kis, that much was still certain, but he should _not_ have taken out this anger on Ori, nor blamed him for giving in to his family. Fili would have to apologise. The sooner the better, and since they were both home now...

Fili opened his door, and heard that Kis was crying. Louder than before. It might been half an hour since Ori had gone to her, maybe more. Panic rose in Fili. Kis should not have still been upset. Ori always managed to calm her down, _always_. Fili ran to the nursery.

Kis was in her bed, wailing and crying desperately. Fili picked her up carefully, holding her close and rocking her in his arms to calm her down while he glanced around and looked for Ori.

The boy was there, in the nursery. Crouched in a corner and curled up on himself, his hands pressed against his ears and his eyes closed, rocking slightly as he often did when he was nervous. He did not look hurt, so Fili decided that the most urgent was to take care of Kis. There was a smell coming from her that said well enough what her problem was. Fili had never changed her diapers before, but he had seen Ori and the nurse do it. He tried to do what they had done, carefully cleaning her bottom before putting a new cloth on her. She was crying less after that, but she was not pacified yet, and Ori showed no sign of getting better.

Since he knew nothing else, Fili took Kis to his own room, put her on the bed, and grabbed his violin again. He was more careful to play well this time, lullabies and merry songs that seemed to please her. He played until she fell asleep, and then a little more. When he was sure she would not wake up, he picked her up again and brought her back to her own bed. He felt oddly proud to have managed that much on his own, but didn't stop to celebrate. Ori was still in his corner, and though his hands were no longer on his ears, he was still rocking and clearly unwell.

As gently as he could, Fili made Ori stand up. He helped the boy walk to his room, and then helped him get on his bed. He even tucked Ori under a blanket. Once that was done, Fili left the room and rang for a servant. He ordered dinner for himself, and that soup and herbal tea be brought for Ori on a tray so he could eat in his room. He then asked that Sain be called back, since Ori seemed to have let hir go for the day. When dinner arrived a little later, Fili asked that the servant did not talk to Ori unless the boy spoke to him first.

"He is unwell," he explained clumsily, because he knew people liked to gossip. "Headache, you know."

Fili hoped she believed him. His mother would probably know by morning, but hopefully by then he would have had time to talk to Ori about what had happened, to make sure it never happened again.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> sorry for this not very happy chapter  
> have a family picture to make things better? http://tagathsketch.tumblr.com/post/92719183653/


	11. communication

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Fili and Ori talk about things, at last

Fili slept little that night, eaten by guilt over what had happened to Ori. By the time a servant came to wake him up, the prince had convinced himself that he wasn't safe for Ori and Kis, and that his entire family would hate him for failing to protect them. He half feared to see Kili's ghost in the drawing room, coming back to say how disappointed he was.

But instead of his brother's ghost, he just found Ori sitting at their table. He had a full breakfast in front of him, untouched, and was reading something on a sheet of paper. He didn't look _well_ as such, pale and tense he was, but still better than he had been the night before. Fili sat near him, wondering how to ask about his state the previous night without sounding rude.

"I have made a list," Ori said, one word at a time, holding out his paper. "In order of recommendation and with the names and addresses. I will understand if you disagree with my preferences, but I think it would be the best option to pick Hron."

That was the first name on the list, out of a dozen. None of them were people Fili knew, and judging by their addresses, most of them must have been of modest origin.

"Who are these people, Ori?"

"They have all had babies recently, or will soon," Ori said, fidgeting with the leather band on his right wrist.

"My congratulations to them. What is it to me?"

"Wet nurse? For Kis?" Ori whispered, forcing the words to come out. "Lost my chance."

That was, if anything, only making things more cryptic than before, and Fili wasn't good enough at dealing with mornings to guess at riddles.

"Your chance for what? Why would Kis need a wet nurse? We have a nurse already to help you, right? And you can still... feed her, right?" Fili asked with a vague gesture toward Ori's chest. It was fuller than it used to be, big enough that the boy's large jumpers couldn't hide it. It looked like it could work, but Fili was no expert. "You aren't sick, are you?"

Poor Ori looked utterly confused, and a little angry maybe. He wasn't wearing his usual blank mask at least, but Fili wasn't so sure it was a good thing.

"Kis," the boy hissed. "You're taking her away. Sending me away. Taking her from me. You gave a chance. I failed. I'm too _stupid_ to care for her. All yours now, like you wanted!"

"Ori, I didn't... I was upset last night, I wouldn't..."

"Not just last night!" Ori snarled, tears threatening to fall at the corners of his eyes as he banged his fists against the table. "Always, always! You call her your daughter, you claimed her, you say I have to be like you want, and I _can't_! I know you can take her from me if I'm not good enough. I tried and I can't, I _try_ to be good, I try to learn to be your husband, I try to be a good father, I try to show my dad I'm good, but you _all_ shout and become angry! I try, I try, I try, I _try_! It's too much, everything is _too much_ , I _need_ Kis but I _can't_. _My_ baby, but I can't anymore, feel like I'll collapse and die if I try more."

Ori didn't cry, and instead glared at his plate as if it were responsible for his exhaustion, clawing at the leather on his wrist.

Fili had been so proud of himself until then. Except for his anger at discovering that Ori listened when he played the violin, and his outburst of the previous night, he had thought that he had been fairly good around Ori. He had never really thought to ask the boy if he agreed with that. He'd never really thought about telling Ori that he had nothing to prove, either, nor wonder at his insistence to care for Kis almost entirely on his own. For all that Ori was the one who had trouble talking, Fili hadn't been much better at communicating.

Better late than never then.

"No one is taking Kis from you, Ori," he promised. "I don't have that right, because you are her father. Mother and uncle would never let me take her from you, and I do not _want_ to take her from you. I know how much you care from her, and I know that Kili would never forgive me if I hurt you that way. I know I have never been kind to you in the past, but please believe me when I say I would never take away your daughter. I am not the best of dwarves, but I try to not be cruel on purpose either."

"Lie," was Ori's only answer.

And it was one indeed, because Fili _had_ been cruel to him, more than once, just to get revenge on the boy who had seduced his brother.

"I'll do my best to make sure it is never again a lie. If you want... today we could go see my mother, and I'll make her promise she _will_ stop me if I ever do anything to hurt you again."

Ori shrugged coldly, and Fili sighed. He was going to offer Thorin's word too, and hope that his uncle wouldn't be seen as biased, when he realised there was one person Ori might trust even when he trusted no one else.

"We'll go see Nori then," he decided. "You will tell hir that you think I might take Kis from you, and any other worry you might have about me and your life here. You _know_ ze won't let me hurt you. Ze threatened to kill when ze thought Kis was my child, and we both know ze _would_ have done it if ze thought I had hurt you. Then if you ever again feel threatened by me, you can tell hir and ze'll make sure I behave. Does that sound fair?"

The boy considered it for a moment, and eventually nodded. Fili felt strangely relieved then, even though Nori would probably be very unhappy to hear that hir brother had felt so miserable because of him.

 

They went to see Nori at lunchtime. Ori was carrying Kis against his chest, the baby tied to him with a long piece of fabric, the Broadbeam way. Fili had always found it odd to look at, but Kis seemed happy, and Ori looked comfortable and glad to have his daughter so close. It made Fili almost jealous, and he thought of asking if he could learn to carry her like that. He dared not, in the end. He was not sure he had any right to it.

In the street, people stopped them several times to congratulate them and ask to see Kis. Ori had not left the palace since the birth, so people were glad to see he was well. Fili made sure to not linger too long with anyone. They would need time to talk to Nori, and he didn't want Ori to get overwhelmed by people before they even reached his sibling.

Nori, thankfully, was in hir office. A grand name for the back room of a small, seedy tavern which ze owned, but at least people knew where to find hir. Ze seemed happy to see hir brother and niece, but hir good mood rapidly decreased when they explained the reason of their visit. Ze listened to Fili silently. When the prince was done talking, Nori sent him back to the main room to listen to Ori. After what felt like an eternity, Fili was called back inside. Nori was angry but not _murderous_ , which the prince took as a good sign.

"You've been one damn little prick to my baby brother," Nori grunted. "But I've seen you be worse than that to him, and I think you're trying to be what passes as _decent_ in that pretty little head of yours. _Trying_ , mind. Not really succeeding so far."

"Which is why we're here," Fili pointed out, before turning to Ori. "I swear I want to be nice now. It's what Kili would have wanted. I'm trying, I just don't really know what to do to help you."

Ori was unimpressed, and fidgeted the leather band on his wrist again.

"Don't always use Kili as an excuse," he retorted. "I deserve respect just for being me. I miss him too. Don't always use him as an excuse."

Fili almost protested that he did no such thing, but thought better of it. If it upset Ori, then he would try to talk less of Kili. He _could_ do that. Just as he could follow the other instructions that Nori gave him. They were small, easy things for the most, but he still asked for a sheet of paper and wrote down everything, anxious to get things right. Not just because Nori might gut him if he misbehaved, but because he _wanted_ to make things better. He would _not_ be like Naren.

And speaking of him, there was at least one thing on which Nori agreed with him: Naren couldn't be allowed anywhere near Kis, and ideally he shouldn't go near Ori either.

"People like him don't change their minds," Nori told hir brother. "The better you'll get, the more he'll talk shit on you, because otherwise he'd have to admit he's been wrong, and you can imagine how likely that is."

Ori looked heartbroken, but he did not insist. Fili felt sorry for him, and he wished he could have made Naren change his mind, but Nori was right. Someone who could insult a baby was someone who couldn't change.

Still, Ori looked less anxious when they walked back home. He smiled at Kis a lot and kissed her a few time.

It would be hard work sometimes, but Fili was glad of his idea. Kili would have been proud of him, he hoped.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> http://www.bbdino.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/03/echarpe-de-portage.jpg this is the way Ori is carrying Kis when they go out, if anyone's interested  
> (my aunt used to carry her daughter like that and it was really cool for everyone involved)


	12. anniversary

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It has been one year since the Battle of the Five Armies

"How much should Sain help you today?" Fili asked.

Ori considered it for a moment, looking at Kis who was having her first breakfast of the day.

"I feel decent, but there is the celebration tonight. Can I just feed Kis today and ze does the rest?"

"It's hir job, so ze can certainly do that. Will you need anything tonight?" Fili carefully added. "I would offer to let you stay here if it were anything else, but..."

"I _want_ to be there anyway," Ori whispered, caressing Kis's cheek.

Fili nodded. _He_ didn't want to go at that celebration of the battle of the five armies, but that was just his way of dealing with grief. Even after a year, the loss of his One still felt as fresh. It would never really go away, people had told him, not when he had lost one half of his soul. He almost envied Ori in such moments, because a boundless love gave him a chance to recover someday.

"Will you need anything else today?" Fili asked, dutifully following the list Nori had given him.

Ori assured him that he was fine, and the prince felt free to finish his breakfast. That new routine was still strange, but it worked. Ori seemed far more relaxed since their talk with Nori, and he no longer insisted on taking care of Kis entirely on his own.

Two nights earlier, Fili had even come home to find the boy drawing, for the first time since they had started living together. It was a portrait of Kis, a beautiful one, and Fili had almost suggested that Dis would love to have it. He had kept silent in the end, still not sure how to make suggestions not sound like orders.

Things were going well. Things were going _very_ well.

Things would have gone _better_ without the anniversary of that cursed battle reminding Fili constantly of what he had lost. Everyone else seemed to be dealing with it. Dis and Thorin took care of their businesses as usual, not a hint of emotion in their voices as they discussed the celebration, and whether they should invite Thranduil or not. They had been like that after Azanulbizar too, and when Fili's father had died in a hunting accident. Keeping their grief private, and only crying when they were alone together. Fili had cried in secret with Kili when their father had passed away, like them, but he had no one to cry with now, and he wished he could have mourned with his mother and uncle.

He wished _he_ could have avoided that cursed celebration, because he did not want to drink and feast in the name of his brother.

But he couldn't, so he finished his breakfast, wished Ori a good day, and went to help supervise the last preparations.

 

They sang for the dead, and drank to their memory. Little Gimli and princess Sigrid read together a list of all those who had fallen in the battle, be they dwarves, men, or even elves. Many people cried, and even Dis's eyes shone brightly when she heard the name if her youngest son. No tears fell from her eyes though, and she was beautiful and proud, looking like those parents in sagas who praised their children for falling in battle and bringing glory to their families. Maybe she did believe that, Fili thought unkindly. It had cost her a son, but she was a true princess once more, so maybe the price wasn't so high.

"You drank too much," Ori said dryly when Fili tried to share that idea.

"I'm not nearly drunk enough yet. I won't be drunk enough until I can forget I've lost my One."

Ori looked disgusted, but did not reply, rocking Kis in his arms instead. It angered Fili who just wanted _someone_ to pay attention to his pain, but he managed to not say anything that might hurt Ori. He did not want Nori to cut his balls over something like that.

At the same time, _Nori_ could take Fili at his worst, and ze had always been a sympathetic ear so far. Maybe he was trying to chat with the wrong sibling. Ori didn't seem to care when Fili left after sharing his intentions, and then, Nori was easy enough to find. Even in the half shadows of a balcony, even without hir more usual three peaks, ze was the sort of dwarf that one could only notice.

"You stink of beer, princeling," Nori welcomed the prince, making room for him in the folds of a curtain where ze was hiding. "Careful, I've heard that dying if alcohol poisoning is pretty painful."

"Who cares, if I died I'd not be alone anymore at least. I'd be with Kili, and we wouldn't care that no one is mourning us."

"People would mourn, princeling. Your mother, your uncle..."

"You need a heart to mourn, and look at them. They feel _nothing_."

Fili drunkenly glared at them. Everyone was either sad, or trying to get merry to honour the dead, but Dis and Thorin were impassive. Stone would show more feeling than them.

"We don't all mourn by shouting at everyone, princeling. _I'd_ mourn you, by the way. Might even go so far as to drink to your memory. You're fun enough to be around, when you forget to be a prick."

"Why don't you mourn Kili then? He was more fun than me."

For a moment, Nori remained silent. Ze stared at Fili with an odd expression on hir face, and then gazed toward Ori.

"I miss your brother," ze said after a while. "I miss him because he was a nice boy. I miss him because he gave Ori strength and courage, and made him smile like no one else ever did before. I miss him because he made _you_ smile too, and if I could I'd bring him back to make my two favourite people happy again. Your pain ain't mine princeling, but it doesn't mean I feel no pain."

Fili wasn't sure he liked that someone would miss Kili not for himself, but for his link to others. His brother had been too _amazing_ to be missed for the sake of others. Before he could say anything though, Ori joined them, Kis attached against his chest.

"Want to go home," he explained, and with the noise of the celebration and the memories, Fili couldn't blame him.

"Go, I'll make excuses for you."

"Walk me home, please?"

Nori smiled, but not Fili.

"You know the way, don't you? You don't need me."

Ori caressed his daughter's shoulder nervously and threw an imploring look at Nori whose smile widened before ze slapped the back of Fili's head.

"He's offering you a way out of here, you prick," Nori explained. "You've been looking like a pig waiting for slaughter all night. Well, here's a perfectly valid excuse to go home: gotta get your husband and the babe safe at home."

Ori nodded, looking at the ground and blushing as if he'd done something wrong. Fili was so grateful he could have kissed him, which he said, and Ori went a little redder. He was smiling though, a proud little smile that made him look truly pretty. Fili thanked him, then thanked Nori, and after a quick warning to Dis, they left together. It did not take them very long to get to their apartments, both of them eager to leave the party far behind them.

"Can you help with Kis?" Ori asked shyly once they were home. "Diaper is dirty but I'm tired..."

"Anything you want. You'll have to tell me what to do though, I've only done it once, and Sain said a dog would have done a better job than me."

Ori frowned at the joke, but said nothing and went to the nursery. He put Kis on the table they used to change her diapers, and though he was tired he managed to guide Fili through the whole process. They put the little princess to bed then, and since she didn't look so tired, they watched her try to grasp a toy that was just out of her reach.

"She really doesn't look like Kili," Fili said after giving her the toy out of mercy. "I had so hoped she would."

"She will," Ori retorted confidently. "She does. Same smile."

Fili hadn't seen her smile often enough to know that. He hoped it was true. Kili had had a wonderful smile that made the world a better place. Kili as a whole had made the world a better place.

"I miss him so much," he murmured, touching Kis's cheek. "All the time, I miss him all the time, because he should be by my side, and he's not, and it's like... like..."

"Like the sun will never shine again, and the moon and stars fell from the sky, and there won't ever be any more light in the world. Just darkness and silence for ever."

Fili nodded silently. He would not have chosen these exact words, but they were still true. A world without Kili was a world that should not have been allowed to exist.

"I should have died instead of Kili," he whispered. "You and him would have had your baby, and the three of you would have been happy without me to constantly attack you anymore."

There was a long silence.

"Sometimes, I wish that," Ori confessed. "But I know it's not true. Kili would have missed you too much to be happy. He needed you more than you needed him."

That certainly wasn't true. Fili wasn't the one who had wanted a lover, the one who made friends everywhere. Kili always wanted to be with other people, and Fili could do nothing about it but to wait for him to come back. And he always came back. He had so many friends, he could make anyone love him, but he always came back to Fili.

Always, except this time.

Fili did not realise he was crying until Ori used one of his sleeves to dry his cheeks. He looked so serious as he did so, like a brave little soldier holding on even though everything was lost. Fili cried harder, and pulled Ori into a hug, just to not be alone. He tried to pull away when he remembered that the boy hated being touched, but by then Ori's arms were locked around his waist, keeping him in place. And there, feeling safe and cared for, Fili cried until he was sure there was not a single tear left in him. He still sobbed dryly, not calming down until Ori took him to his own bed. There, Fili fell asleep with his arms tight around the shoulders of that boy he had so hated once.

He had expected, when he woke up later next to a still sleeping Ori, to feel ashamed of these tears, but he did not. He only felt a little less lonely, and that was a good thing to feel.

 


	13. babysitting

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Fili has to take care of Kis for a day, but Dori comes to help

"There is milk in these bottles," Ori explained, and Fili grimaced. "Feed her if she cries and is clean. Make her burp after. Change her diaper as soon as you notice it's dirty. Don't let her put anything to her mouth, she could choke. Dori will probably come this afternoon, or for lunch."

"That's the most you've ever said to me at once," Fili laughed. "Unless we count shouting."

His trait of humour was not appreciated by Ori who glared at him. Granted, Fili should have known better than to joke when his husband was nervous, but he was anxious too and needed that to relax. Sain had fallen ill right on the day Ori and Dis were meant to go to Dale to meet some merchants, and they would have been forced to cancel if Fili hadn't offered himself. 

It had seemed like a good idea, until Ori decided that Dori should come help.

Fili had never really gotten along with the dwarf, even before they became brothers-in-law. Their opinion of each other had long been simple. Dori was a smothering fool whose overprotection of Ori had made the boy the awkward, socially incompetent mess that he was. Fili was a vain, spoiled boy with no consideration for others and an intense possessiveness over his brother that crossed the line of sanity. It was possible that both of them had changed their mind over the last few months, of course. But Fili was convinced that anything Dori thought of him could only be worse than before.

“ I’ll be careful,” Fili promised, as seriously as he could. “I’ll take good care of her. I love her too, remember? Even if she’s your daughter, she  _ still  _ is my child.”

That brought a smile to Ori’s lips, where just a few weeks earlier his face was carefully blank every time Fili claimed Kis as his. That was progress.

And it was progress, too, that Ori only looked mildly panicked when Dis came to fetch him, and they left together. A month earlier, he would never have left Fili alone with the baby, for fear that she be taken from him.

Progress.

  
  


Fili tried to work at first. He had some reports to read, and even if Thorin had said he could take the day off, he was too used to working to stop. That only lasted until the first time Kis cried, which turned out to be much earlier than the prince would have expected. She was hungry it turned out, and once she was done eating, she was in a playful mood. Fili had thought she was too young and fragile to be played with, but after a few minutes of peekaboo he changed his mind. Kis was so delighted every time he reappeared, smiling and gurgling as if she hadn’t seen him in a lifetime.

Ori had been right, she had Kili’s smile.

After realising that, Fili gave up on working entirely. Instead he took Kis in his arms, and did his best to make her smile more. When she cried again he changed her, and since she was getting sleepy, he put her to bed, feeling proud of himself for getting things right.

Except that sleepy or not, Kis refused to close her eyes, crying until he held her again, then dozing until he tried to put her back to bed.

“You really are your father’s daughter,” Fili told her the fourth time he put her in her bed. “You know, I’m almost wishing you were as quiet as Ori. I bet he never cried so much when he was your age.” The prince took a moment to think, and grimaced. “Then again, I also bet he never got to smile as much as you do.”

The little princess just kept crying, and Fili sighed. Dori would be there any moment now, and if he came in to find Kis crying… 

Ori, of course, would have known what to do. Ori always knew what to do when it came to Kis. He was as dedicated to understanding her as he was to drawing or writing. Fili admired and envied that, certain that he would never manage to do half as well… and the fact that Kis was crying right then proved it well enough.

It took him a while to remember Kis loved the sound of violin as much as her fathers. Once he remembered it, though, it took but a few minutes for the baby to finally fall asleep. Fili kept playing after that, mostly for himself. He did not want to go back to work, but he had nothing else to do, so music felt like a good compromise. 

If he had not been born a prince, the violin would have been his calling, his craft. Some days he had dreamed of it, of being a travelling musician with no attaches, just him and Kili going from town to town and making people happy with music… He wondered how Ori and Kis would have fit in that life. Making Ori stay behind would not have been an option, not with Naren around who might hurt him… but travelling with a baby wasn’t easy. Still, they might have managed it. It would have been a good life, the four of them… and maybe more than four in time, because if Ori had gotten with child from just _one_ time, then Kis might have had siblings in that fantasy life. Many niblings for Fili to love… and if they’d been anything like Kis, he would have loved them indeed. And he wouldn’t have minded Ori so much, because he would have had time to know him…

He _hoped_ he would have learned to tolerate Ori, in this fantasy life. Somehow, a world without the boy’s quiet presence nearby had become almost as unbearable to him as a world without Kili's exuberant personality. Fili had gotten used to that odd little husband of his, to his silences, to the way his face remained blank and his voice was often lost but he could say a thousand things with gestures, to the way he could be fragile and strong all at once. If someone had told him in Ered Luin that one day, he would consider Ori an essential part of his life, he would have punched them, but there he was. He was lost without Kili, but he would have been even more lost without Ori and Kis.

Between the music and his fantasy, Fili did not notice Dori had come into the nursery until the older dwarf cleaned his throat. The violin made an ugly noise that had them both wince, and made Kis stir up a little, but thankfully she did not wake up.

“I knocked but no one answered,” Dori said coldly. “I became worried and came in to see if everything was right.”

“ Kis didn’t want to sleep,” Fili mumbled, and  _ this _ was what he hated about Dori. He had a way of making anyone feel like a naughty child, even when they had done nothing wrong. Granted, for most of their acquaintance, Dori had only bothered with Fili if he really had done something wrong, but the feeling was still awful.

“Well, she is sleeping now. You’d better leave her alone, or you’ll wake her up. Has she eaten yet?”

“Yes. I changed her too,” Fili said proudly, hoping his brother-in-law would see he was a decent father.

Dori looked utterly unimpressed and left the nursery, glaring at the prince in a way that made it clear he was expected to leave too.

“You can go back to your duties if you want,” Dori said in an icy voice. “I will take care of her now.”

“I can do it,” Fili protested. “I’ve managed just fine this morning, I’ll have you know. I can take care of a baby.”

“ Can you? I’m told you barely look at her on the best of days. I understand, of course. Your brother’s bastard… I suppose we should be  _ grateful  _ you’ve done anything at all for her.”

Fili stared at Dori, unable to form words for a couple seconds, shocked and hurt and furious as he was.

“She is not anyone’s bastard!” he exclaimed after a few seconds, because that was the most unfair part of the attack. “I married Ori so that no one could ever call Kis a bastard, and if I won’t allow it from strangers, I won’t allow it from you!”

“ Yes, yes. As I’ve said, we’re all so  _ grateful  _ to you. What a noble  _ sacrifice _ .”

This, too, was why Fili couldn’t stand Dori, never had. He could make a small smile and a few polite words feel more aggressive than any nasty insults Nori might have known (and Nori knew some terrible ones indeed). If Fili was aggressive in return, it made him look like the terrible person, since Dori had said nothing bad as such. But if he just ignored it, it felt as if Dori had won somehow, and that was just as bad.

“I don’t care about gratefulness. I just want Kis and Ori to be safe and happy.”

“Isn’t that a first.”

“I’ve changed,” Fili grunted.

He had, really. Or he was  _ changing  _ at least, and if Nori could trust him, why couldn’t hir brother?

“ Naren, too, has changed,” Dori retorted. “He has changed… oh,  _ dozens _ of times. People like him are always saying they’ve changed, you know. He won’t ever make my mother cry again. He’ll never again insult Ori, or me. He won’t fight with Nori. People like you have always changed, and when things continue as before, it’s because the people around you are making you do it. Naren has changed, but my mother is still not a giving him a real son, Ori is still an idiot, Nori is still a whore, and he can’t be blamed for his anger, can he?”

“I’m not Naren,” Fili said, more weakly than he would have liked. “I don’t want to be like him. I’m doing my best… I don’t _want_ to be like that! I’ve… I’ve made a deal with Nori, and if I’m ever like that ze’ll tell me and…”

“And you’ll promise to change again? Say you’ll never do that again, hm?”

Something twisted unpleasantly inside Fili. They’d never really spoken of what would happen if Fili couldn’t control his temper and learn to listen to Ori. They’d all assumed he could do it, but maybe they shouldn’t have.

“What should I do if it happens?” he asked.

Dori would know, wouldn’t he? He had to have thought about that, after all these years of watching Naren hurt his family. But the question still took him by surprise, and he looked suspiciously at the prince.

“You’ll leave him alone, of course,” Dori said. “Give him and Kis a room away from you, and not try to talk to them. Might even be good to get them a house outside of the palace, so they’re free to live their lives entirely away from you. Could you do that, though?”

“I’m not sure,” Fili admitted, because the thought of losing Kis, of not seeing Ori anymore… “But I will talk to Nori, and ask hir to make me do it if it comes to it.”

"Hir best friend against hir brother, then. It would be interesting to see hir faced with that choice. How far will ze run to avoid that decision, I wonder."

Anger and nausea flashed through Fili.

"You then!" He exploded.  "You come and force me to let them go if I prove to be dangerous for them! You or anyone you like! I don't want to be a danger for Ori and Kis, I'm trying not to be, so just tell me what to do and I will!"

"You can start by controlling that temper," Dori snapped, but there was less anger to his voice. "But fine. Nori will make sure you act the right way, and I will make sure ze does too. Not that I fully trust either of you, but Ori does, and I will respect that."

"Thank you. I'll do my best not to disappoint."

Dori nodded, with something of a warning in his gentle smile. Once, Kili had said that obtaining Dori's approval had worried him far more than Nori's. Fili had laughed at the time, but he thought he understood now.

Soon, Dori demanded tea to break the silence between them, and Fili quickly ordered some. The older dwarf smiled briefly when tea arrived with some of Ori's favourite biscuits. Feeding Ori things he liked gave Fili a few good points. Relaxing at last, Dori started chatting about the price of fruit in the market, and how good were the mushrooms at the moment. Ori loved them roasted, he said, and Fili made a note to tell their cook. He also offered Dori to feed his niece when she would wake up again, but he politely refused.

"I would not want to take from you such a precious moment of bonding. With how busy you are, you must not have a lot of time to care for her."

The veiled criticism annoyed Fili, who almost retorted that being a prince gave him little free time indeed. But that was just an excuse, he knew it, and he was sure Dori knew it too.

"I never know how much I should be a part of her life," he confessed, and the surprise on Dori's face pleased him. "I love her but I'm terrified of doing something wrong because she's so tiny... and Ori used to think I wanted to take her away from him, I worry he'll think that again if I try to be too involved."

"Then do things  _ with _ him, not  _ instead _ of him, unless he asks you to," Dori advised. "Ask him to show you how to do things... do you often play the violin for her?"

"I have only done it a few times since her birth."

"Then do it more, and in Ori's presence. He loves music, that's what convinced him to give your brother a chance I think. Buy toys for Kis, because he won't dare, and pretty clothes if you can. Show that you care for her, for the Maker's sake, because if you don't people will gossip, and  _ that _ will hurt Ori and her."

Fili promised. He did not fear gossip for himself, never had, but Ori wasn't him. And it would be nice, buying toys for Kis. She was still young for the ones Bifur made, but she would know where to find something fun for his little daughter.

She would be a spoiled little princess, and Fili would love spoiling her.

 

 


	14. trip to Mirkwood

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Fili learns to control his jealousy, and Ori doesn't

Kis was growing fast and well. She started crawling everywhere as soon as her body was strong enough to allow it, and everyone who had known Kili as a baby made comparisons between them. Dis in particular frequently joked that she was glad the toddler wasn't hers to raise, though she still spent a good deal of her free time with her granddaughter.

"It's not like I can expect more grandchildren," she told Fili when he tried to tease her about that. "I'm lucky to have just this one, really, so you can be sure I intend to fully enjoy this chance of being a doting grandmother,  especially since it seems she wont have other grandparents."

Fili winced at that and quickly glanced at Ori. His face was as blank as ever, but he started playing with that leather bracelet of his. Fili knew it pained him that his mother had never tried to visit again. He had worked hard at accepting that his father would never want to see him as anything but a failure, but losing his mother too was a harder blow.

"We are glad Kis has you," Ori said politely.

"And I am so glad to have her," Dis replied, grabbing the child as she crawled nearby. Kis fought back at first, but was eventually pacified with a hard biscuit. "We need to start thinking of celebrating her birthday you know. It is only a month away."

Ori couldn't help a grimace at the idea of a party, and it made Fili smile. Ori was getting a little more expressive over time, and the prince had decided it meant his little husband was starting to get over everything bad that had happened to him. It might also have meant that Ori trusted him now, was comfortable around him, and _that_ was a pleasant thought.

"It will have to be something simple, mother. And if you want a party, _you_ will have to organise it, because Ori doesn't like it, and I'm busy with that treaty with Thranduil. I'll be lucky to even be here for Kis's birthday. Uncle wants me to go to Mirkwood."

"Oh, your uncle is a bore," Dis grumbled, wincing when Kis grabbed one bead in her beard and pulled on it. "But I suppose it would be nice to set things right with the elves. We do need to get along with our neighbours, even when they are unsufferable tree fuckers. Don't we, Kis? Yes, yes we do!"

"I can't believe you're the same person who used to scold uncle for saying _damn_ in front of us," Fili laughed.

Dis smirked, and kissed her granddaughter before putting her back on the ground. Kis grabbed the hem of Dis's dress and started sucking on it, but her grandmother didn't notice.

"Children and grandchildren are different," Dis explained very seriously. "I had to make sure you would be fit for the roles that awaited for you. But I'm a grandmother now, and my duty is to spoil her rotten, let her have bad habits with me, and then leave the two of you to deal with the consequences."

Fili laughed, while Ori smiled politely as he did when he couldn't see the humour in something. They talked of other things then, politics and art and the outrageous price of jam from Laketown. They all agreed that he was far too expensive, and not nearly as good as what they could sometimes buy from hobbits when they were in Ered Luin. They talked a little of Bilbo then, who had written to Balin a few times, and seemed to greatly enjoy being a scandalous relative around his younger cousins. Dis left soon after that, but promised to come back soon, to talk with Ori about that birthday party.

 

"Will you really be away for Kis's birthday?" Ori asked that evening during dinner.

Kis was in bed already, and Fili was unhappily staring at mashed potatoes covered in a strange sauce, along with beef tongue. He would have to talk to the cook to make sure it was the last time their were served this, because there was _no way_ he was eating another creature's tongue.

"I might have to. I don't like it, but there's a chance we could get rights over the nearest parts of the forest, and it would help us depend less on the Men for wood. Jam isn't the only overpriced thing they sell us."

Ori nodded, his face blank, but he poked unhappily at his potatoes.

"She won't even know it's her birthday," Fili pointed out, annoyed that he was starting to feel guilty over this. "She won't mind."

"I do. You should do too. _You_ know."

"I can't tell Thranduil to push back negotiations because it's my daughter's birthday," Fili replied dryly. He really was feeling guilty now, and upset that he might miss that moment. As Dis had said herself, it was unlikely Kis would ever have siblings, so he _should_ have been allowed to enjoy ever important moment of her life.

"Thranduil cancelled a visit because of a tree this spring. You can cancel for Kis."

"The tree was important," Fili started, and the furious frown on Ori's face told him that was not the right thing to say at all. "Forget it. I'm not having an argument tonight. I'm doing this for Kis's future, for the kingdom she will rule one day. If I can get us control over the woods, it will be my birthday present to her. Won't _that_ be nice."

Ori shrugged, and Fili left the table before he could get really angry. He went to his room, grabbed his violin, and played.

He didn't know where he stood with Ori lately. Sometimes they got along just fine, almost to the point of friendliness. Then something would happen, and Ori would refuse to understand that Fili had responsibilities, that they _both_ had them, and they would argue. Usually Fili managed to leave before he lost his calm, but twice he had shouted at Ori. It had once ended with Ori upset and frozen where he was, like that evening in the nursery; Fili had had to help him to his room, which had made him even more furious at the moment. He had apologised the next day though, and had told everything to Nori who had just ordered him to buy Ori some _nice_ paper and to be more careful in the future.

Fili _hated_ these arguments, but the rest of the time, he didn't mind so much being married to Ori, not anymore. He could be a good companion at times, and they had things in common, like an interest in history. And Ori loved hearing Fili's violin, while he loved watching the other dwarf draw. Some nights, after they had put Kis to bed, Fili would play music to inspire Ori. Everything they created that way was beautiful, and that included Kis, even if she wasn't really Fili's.

Things would have been so perfect if only Ori had been more _reasonable_.

At the thought of the younger dwarf's attempt to guilt him into staying for Kis's birthday, Fili started playing harder. He made a mess of noise, something that was painful even to him.

He only stopped when he heard a knock on his door. For a second Fili thought of ignoring it, then decided that it would have been mean. When he went to open the door, Ori was there, holding a plate with a few of Fili's favourite biscuits. Bribery at its worst, and it made Fili smile for some reason.

"A peace offering?" he asked, and chuckled when Ori nodded. "Fine, I will talk to uncle to see if I can leave for Mirkwood after her birthday. But don't be angry at me if he says no. Uncle can be stubborn, and a lot of this depends on Thranduil's good will anyway."

Ori smiled, satisfied by that promise, small as it was. Fili took a biscuit, and he was smiling too when he bit into it. Ori was infuriating at times, but Fili almost enjoyed it now and then. He had been upset too about missing the birthday, if he had to be honest, but he would never have dared to put that before his duty to Erebor and his uncle without Ori to demand it.

 

Thranduil refused to delay the negotiations. Something to do with trees and harvest and stars that could not be shared with dwarves. Just an excuse to show he was in control, Thorin said, and Fili half agreed. He'd never really expected this to work anyway, though he would have been happy if it had. And Ori seemed happy that he had tried, which was something. Fili wasn't sure when Ori's happiness had become something that mattered to him, but it was now.

"We'll miss you," the boy told Fili before he left. "Be safe."

"Take good care of Kis," the prince replied, "and mind that mother doesn't spoil her too much."

Ori promised very seriously. It would have annoyed Fili once to see him so serious about a joke. Now it was something sweet about him, unless they were arguing.

Sometimes, even when they were arguing.

After a week in the wood elves realm, Fili missed these arguments with Ori. At least his husband's demands and bouts of anger had some sense. Thranduil just made things complicated for the sake of it, rejecting every proposition that he had until then agreed to. Fili suspected him to be angry that Thorin had regained his kingdom without his help, and it made the prince angry too,  but he tried to still keep his calm. This was important. This was for Kis's future, for Erebor's future.

When things became too much to handle, Fili found an excuse to get out and take out his frustration on a tree. It was a better option than to explode in public. Living with Ori had taught him that at least.

It was during such a moment that Tauriel found him.

"You're hurting the tree with your kicks," she scolded, though without heat. "And you will hurt yourself too. Surely Thranduil's tantrums are not worth so much pain."

The elvenking had announced that he might cancel the deal altogether, before calling off their meeting of the day. Fili felt the king's mood _were_ hurtful already, and that his attacks on that tree were nothing compared to it. He did not say so, and smiled instead.

"I am sorry that you caught me in such an act," Fili apologised in his most charming voice. "I am afraid I am not having a very good day, and was not in good condition to hear your king's decision. It is my daughter's first birthday today, and I am sorry to miss such a day."

Tauriel didn't smile back. She looked so utterly serious that Fili was reminded of Ori, and his heart clenched.

"Thranduil will become reasonable in due time," Tauriel promised. "We need help to keep Mirkwood clean of spiders and other evil creatures. The entire guard is pressuring him to let you have the northern part of the woods, and we are getting other people to join us. He will give in, sooner or later, but you must be patient."

"Isn't it treason to tell me this?" Fili joked.

Tauriel tilted her head, her eyes piercing right through him. Elves had an intense gaze at the best of times, but she was one of the worst he had yet met.

"I do not believe in politics, your highness," she said without taking her eyes off of him. "I believe in keeping people _safe_ , no matter what sort of people they are, no matter whose pride must be hurt in the process. I want you to understand that Thranduil _will_ see reason, for the good of his people, and that you cannot lose patience. If that is treason, then I will gladly be a traitor once more."

Fili smiled at her again, but it was more difficult. The memory of Kili's healing by Tauriel was painful, in more than one way.

"You saved my brother last time you betrayed your king," he said. "I don't think I ever thanked you properly for this. You have my gratitude, and if I can ever do anything for you..."

"I did not truly save him if he fell in battle," Tauriel cut him. "A better healer might have given strength to survive."

"And a better brother would have protected him, or stopped him from fighting that day."

An old guilt of his. If Kili had not taken that arrow to the knee... If Fili had fought harder to keep him away from the battle when he was clearly not in a state to take part in it...

Tauriel smiled at him, and patted his shoulder awkwardly, as if she were not used to the gesture.

"With 'if' you could light a thousand stars," she said. "We cannot change the past, only the future. Even my king must learn to accept this, and let go of old grudges."

"You are nothing like other elves."

"True, but I could say the same of you and other dwarves. No two persons are alike."

Fili smiled, thinking of how easy it would be to become friend with Tauriel. Kili had tried to do that, and as usual, he had been a good judge of character.

But then, thinking of Tauriel and Kili together was a sure way to spoil his mood. _"Do you think she could have loved me?"_ his brother had asked when he was delirious, and this had felt worse than when he had professed his love for Ori. Even if Kili had wanted everyone to love him, making friend with everyone and always looking like he was half flirting, Fili had feared that day...

"Would you like to take home a present for your daughter?" Tauriel suggested. "We make some very pretty cotton to maker her a dress, or you might like the seeds of trees? We often plant them to celebrate a birth, to give the child strength and a merry future. It would be fitting."

"I know little about plants," Fili confessed. "And about fabric too."

"Then you are lucky to have met me. My brother is a weaver, he can help you choose."

Fili hesitated. He didn't want anything coming from Tauriel, but that was only his jealousy speaking. The elf was kind, and she had never asked to catch Kili's interest, nor had she ever been more than friendly to him. She could not be blamed for his crush, could she?

So Fili accepted her offer, and decided to try to be friendly to her. He had learned this too from being around Ori; he could not hate everyone that Kili had liked, it brought him nothing good.

 

It took Thranduil nearly a month to see reason at last. It was about time too, because Fili was starting to have trouble keeping his temper in check. If not for the friendship of Tauriel, and the certainty that he was doing this for the good of Erebor, he would have shouted at the elvenking long before they could reach an agreement.

His first stop, upon returning to the mountain, was to see his uncle to give him two copies if the treaty to sign, one of which would be promptly sent back to Thranduil. Fili did not linger long after that, and ran to his apartments to see Kis and Ori. He had missed his husband, strange as that was. Tauriel had been nice, and so had the dwarves who had travelled with him, but no one could give him anything like Ori's quiet companionship.

When he came home to find Ori and Kis playing in the drawing room's carpet together, Fili felt truly happy, for a second. Then he remembered that this should have been Kili's happiness, not his, and his joy was tainted.

"Welcome home," Ori said with a smile on his face, a real one. His eyes then fell on the package that Fili carried under his arm, and he pointed at it.

"A birthday present for Kis, princess of Erebor,” the prince explained walking toward them and dropping the package on Ori’s knees. “Elven fabric, to make her a pretty dress. I’ve been told blue and gold should look nice on her, with her skin and hair.”

The cry of delight that followed Ori’s discovery of the fabric confirmed that it had been a good choice. The younger dwarf ran his finger over the colourful cotton, enjoying the texture of it. Kis became curious about it of course, and Ori wrapped her in the fabric, making her giggle.

“You like it then,” Fili said smugly. It was not often that Ori was so overtly happy, so the prince felt he was allowed that smugness.

“ _Yes_. You chose it?”

The prince laughed, and knelt down to untangle Kis.

“Sort of. Tauriel and her brother helped a lot, because clothes never were my thing. They… are you okay?”

Next to him, Ori had gone tense, and he shook his head, glaring at the fabric.

“Take it back,” the boy hissed, grabbing the offending piece of cotton and throwing it at Fili. “Don’t want it.”

“You loved it a minute ago!” Fili protested, and Kis cried at the loss of her new game. “Why… because I said Tauriel helped?”

“ _Yes_!”

Ori was livid with anger, and shaking. It had been a while since Fili had seen him so furious, and for it to be over something so _small_ … but then again, the prince knew he had no right to criticise anyone’s jealousy, had he?

Still, the fabric was beautiful, and Tauriel had been _kind_ to him while he had been in Mirkwood.

“I am going to put it away,” he said calmly, folding the cotton in his arms, while Ori took Kis in his. “But would it be acceptable if we talked about this tonight, when Kis is in bed? I will not force you to keep it if it upsets you, but I would like to tell you why I accepted it.”

“ _No_.”

“Ori, _please_! I have the same reasons as you for not wanting to like Tauriel, don’t I? Please, listen to me, and I swear if you still don’t want it, I’ll just keep it for myself and…”

“No!” Ori shouted. “Not for Kis, not for you, not anyone! _No!_ ”

Kis was crying in his arms, just as shocked as Fili by her father’s anger.

“I’ll give it away then,” Fili offered. “I’ll tell Tauriel that it got damaged… we won’t be using it, so calm down Ori, okay? I’m sorry, I did not mean to upset you. I’m putting it away, see?”

The prince quickly got up, and went to throw the fabric in his room, not even looking where it landed. While he did that, Ori had gotten up too, Kis still in his arms, and he came to give her to Fili. The prince took their daughter, and watched Ori walk quickly to his room, banging the door behind him.

“I think I’ve upset your adad a lot,” Fili whispered to the upset child. “Shush love, don’t cry, he won’t be angry for ever, and I’ll be more careful now, won’t I? There, there, don’t cry. I’ll play you that song your other father loved so much, yeah? Oh, you love that one. Come my princess, let’s fetch the violin.”

The music did calm Kis a little, though in the end what worked best was for her to lay on Fili’s chest while he was on his bed, and to sleep there. He had seen Ori do that with her when she was younger, but he had never had a chance to try it before. He quite liked it, but it meant he could not get up without risking waking up Kis. Fili had to stay on his bed until Ori knocked on his door, so softly that it might have gone unheard.

“Come in,” Fili called him. “Can’t move.”

Ori half smiled when he saw them on the bed together. His expression turned sour again when he saw the fabric that Fili had carelessly thrown to the ground earlier, and he glared at it, clawing at the leather band on his right wrist.

“I _know_ Tauriel is nice,” Ori said slowly, enunciating each word. “She helped you and Kili and the others in Laketown. She protected us against the orcs. She _is_ nice. But Kili wanted her. He told me, after. He _wanted_ her, and… I can’t. She is nice. But I _can’t_ , I can’t, I…”

“Fine, you can’t then,” Fili replied soothingly, pushing away his own jealousy at the idea of Kili wanting yet another lover. “I should not have dropped that on you like this. I wasn’t so happy myself when she first talked to me, and I didn’t like the way he looked at her either.”

Ori nodded seriously, and walked to the bed. Fili expected him to take back Kis, but instead the younger dwarf climbed on the mattress and cuddled against the prince. It felt odd and pleasing at once, and Fili wanted it to never stop. He missed having someone to cuddle with. Kili had often been physical in his demonstrations of affections, which had made the fact that he could restrain himself around Ori all the more surprising. Maybe it was why he kept wanting people, because he so liked to be touched, and only had a One who didn't want intimacy with him, and a lover who couldn't stand contact... Tauriel hadn't been the only one. There had been that elf in Rivendell, and Fili had wondered about his brother affection for Bilbo, and even back in Ered Luin... he'd only spoken of love for Ori, but he had _looked_ at many others.

“Dinner will be served soon,” Fili yawned, to avoid thinking of his brother in anyone’s arms. “We should not stay here, we’ll fall asleep.”

Ori nodded, but huddled closer, resting his head on Fili’s shoulder and one hand on Kis’s back. Fili pulled and pushed until his arm that wasn’t holding the baby was around Ori’s shoulders and he could touch the boy’s hair. It was stolen happiness, something that should have belonged to his brother... He hoped that Kili would have known to appreciate that, instead of flirting with elves or any other pretty creature coming his way.

Right then, Fili appreciated it enough for the two of them anyway.


	15. of love and dwarves

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A small joke by Dwalin has Fili think a lot

“I’d never have expected you to really fall for that kid, but I’m glad you did. It’s good for all of you.”

Fili stared at Dwalin, his mouth open in shock as he tried to decided if he should laugh or get angry. Everyone in the company knew how fake the story of sudden love surrounding his marriage to Ori was, but they usually just didn’t talk about it.

"I'm _not_ in love with Ori, if that's what you're trying to say. Just because we get along these days doesn't make it love, you know."

There was something extremely annoying in the way Dwalin laughed then. It made Fili want to drop that subject and go back to what they should have been talking about. Namely, the next celebration if the battle of the five armies. Had Fili been a good and reasonable dwarf he would have gone back to work, but he was too curious for his own good.

"Why would you even think I love him?"

Dwalin laughed again, very smug. Clearly Fili's question was a proof he was right.

"You're always talking 'bout him, for one thing. Ori did this, Ori said that, Ori prefers this, can de have this food because Ori prefers it... Even your brother was more subtle than that."

"I have no idea what you're trying to imply about Kili," the prince grumbled. "And of course I talk about Ori, we're married and live together. But just for Kis's sake, I'll have you know. No silly romance here."

"Yeah, and my ass is chicken," Dwalin sniggered. "I live with Balin you know, but I can talk of things other than him. And I don't go all puppy eye at him or my friends the way you do with that boy."

"He's not really a boy anymore," Fili corrected before he could stop himself.

Dwalin laughed once more, and Fili had never found his uncle's friend so annoying before. He was not in love with anyone, and he _didn_ 't have puppy eyes. That had been Kili's thing to do.

"Look, can we go back to work?" He sighed with exasperation. "I would appreciate not spending the afternoon with you. I have more interesting things to do today than discuss which cooks we should hire for the celebration. Especially when we all know we'll just take whoever Bombur recommended."

"And what other important business do you have today then?"

There was a smug smirk on Dwalin's face, and Fili felt his face heat up.

"Ori was invited to dine with one of the scribes he was apprenticed with," Fili grumbled guiltily,  "and he asked me to come for moral support."

This time, Dwalin did not laugh. He just smiled, and somehow that was worse.

  


The very idea of being in love with Ori was ridiculous of course. Fili wasn't sure he could fall in love at all. He'd never felt anything romantic toward anyone in his life, never seriously. A few quick crushes as a child, but nothing since Kili's name had first appeared on his wrist. He'd never really minded, because he had so many other things to keep him busy, lessons and duties, games with Kili and music. He didn't even know what love was supposed to feel like, except for what he'd heard in sagas and Kili's passion for Ori. Love was a foreign land Fili had never wanted to visit, but he suddenly found himself curious.

Once, he would have asked Kili, but that was no longer an option. Ori must have known about love, but Fili wasn't sure they could safely talk about that; quite frankly, the mere idea made him blush. Dis did not like the subject, she still missed her husband too much. Thorin took lovers sometimes, but he admitted himself that romance did not interest him.

"And that's how you ended up asking me about love," Nori said, some days after that conversation with Dwalin. " because you have no one else. Feeling so flattered right now, I swear. Any reason for that sudden interest in that shit?"

Fili shrugged, and shook his head. Nori was a friend, but the prince doubted he would like to hear anyone thought he was interested in Ori.

"Love is shit," Nori spat. "Bless the Maker that you don't feel it, and stop thinking about it."

"Sounds pretty bitter of you."

"My baby brother lost the love of his life before he was _eighty_ ,” Nori snapped. “My other brother lost _his_ One to the orcs of Moria, before even meeting them. Which is lucky really, 'cause my mother's One is a monster who frequently insults and abuses her, but she won't leave him because it's _fate_ . And me… in a world where I am, quite honestly, a fucking catch that half the mountain wants to seduce, I’ve somehow managed to half fall in love with possibly the only fucking dwarf here who would never consider me. Yeah, I'm _bitter_ enough."

It was odd to think that somewhere under all hir snark and aggressivity, Nori had a heart. It was odder still to imagine hir in love. Fili imagine love as something tender and sweet, or passionate and devouring, and neither of these things fit with what he knew of Nori.

“You’re _never_ in love,” the prince said, half taunting and half scared.

“You’re so wrapped up in your grief and thoughts, you can’t even imagine others have feelings too,” Nori replied coldly. “It’s no wonder your brother went to have a look somewhere else. Ori doesn’t talk the tenth of what you do, but Mahal help me, with the shit you say, sometimes I wish you’d shut up too.”

“I didn’t mean…”

One gesture from Nori was enough to silence Fili. He’d never seen his friend so angry before, or at least never at him, and it scared him.

“You never mean anything!” Nori snarled. “You’re a damn pest sometimes, shouting at everyone because you’ve lost your brother, as if you’re the only one to feel fucking pain… well big news princeling, you’re fucking not. Wanna know what love is, eh? Well I’ll tell you. It’s nothing like those damn stories you’ve heard as a kid. Love is possessive and selfish, it’s wanting someone to smile for you only, and want to hurt them if they so much as look at someone else. Love is wanting someone’s happiness, but only if you’re the source of it, because thinking of them happy with anyone else is a fucking torture, and you want to tear them apart for hurting you that way. _That’s_ what love is. So congrats I guess, because clearly you _loved_ your brother.”

Fili’s stomach twisted unpleasantly, and he glared at Nori. It hurt to hear that thrown at him, hurt so much that he’d wanted to hit the other dwarf to make hir shut up. He hadn’t, but only because he knew that even for all of their friendship, Nori would not tolerate any sort of violence against hirself.

“It was not like that,” he hissed. “I didn’t… it wasn’t like that! I’m not like that! Just because _you_ can’t be _decent_ to people you like doesn’t mean that…”

“You got until I count to ten to leave my office,” Nori said, voice colder than ice. “Once you’ve left, you’re not coming back anywhere near me until I say you can, because I’m fucking done with right now. If you come back, I’ll tear of you balls with my bare fingers and feed them to the first pig I see. And that’ll just be the start. Understood?”

"Oh, come on!”

“One.”

“Nori, for Mahal’s sake, you’re not seriously…”

“Two.”

Fili looked at his friend. He took in Nori’s hard face, the way ze was not playing with any knives, as he normally did when he was making half empty threats.

“Three.”

Fili did not even try to apologize. Now was not the time for it. He just left, and hoped that whatever he’d said had not killed their friendship.

  


Kis had been allowed to stay up a little later than usual, for a reason that Fili had already forgotten, but she was in bed now. Her parents were now enjoying the quiet, Fili playing music at Ori’s request, and Ori reading something about Durin the Deathless. It was comfortable, as most of their evenings tended to be lately, but Fili couldn’t get Nori’s words out of his head, about the cruelty of love.

“How did you know that you loved Kili?” Fili asked, lowering his violin and putting it on the nearest surface.

A bad question to ask, when they usually avoided all talk of Kili between them. But Nori’s definition of love had not satisfied him, and he needed the opinion of someone who had been happy, even just for a short while.

Ori shook his hands to attract Fili’s attention, and started signing. He did that sometimes, when he didn’t trust his voice to say things.

/Adad had been awful to me that day,/ Ori explained. /It was before Kili and me dated. I didn’t want to let him be more than a friend. But adad had been awful, he’d called me all sorts of names and accidentally hit my wrist. Then my master had been angry at me too, because I wasn’t writing as well as usual. It was a very bad day and I just wanted to curl up and hide. When I left my master’s place and saw Kili, I was angry. I did not want to have to talk to anyone. But he talked and made a joke, and I smiled. Then he said something else, and I laughed. He made me feel better, just by being here. He wasn’t even trying. He just had to be there. And I wanted him to always be there, to never leave me. He made me happy and I wanted him to be happy too, and I decided I couldn’t pretend any more. I let him kiss me that day, for the first time./

Ori blushed then, and threw a worried look toward the prince. Fili, much to his own surprise, didn’t feel angry. This was a definition of love he could get behind, something closer that what he hoped had been his relationship with his brother… there had been bad moments between them, but still, the memory of Kili’s smile whenever he had seen his little boyfriend...

“You made him happy too,” he told Ori. “He was insufferable the night he came home and said he’d kissed you, but even before… even when you only let him be your friend, he was happy from that. He loved spending time with you… and you felt like such a threat to me. I might have handled someone he would have just wanted to fuck, but not… that. Not you being _important_ to him.”

“Sorry.”

“Don’t be,” Fili chuckled joylessly. “You did nothing wrong. I had no business thinking that our bound gave me rights over Kili. If he wanted a lover, and I couldn’t give him that, then I had no right being selfish…”

Ori stood up. He walked to Fili, and took both of the prince’s hands, looking deadly serious.

“Kili was selfish too, because he knew this was hurting you and he did it anyway.”

It was silly of Fili to grab Ori and hug him tight, but he did it anyway, and the other dwarf didn’t resist.

He’d never known how much he’d wanted to hear those words until Ori said them. Everyone had called himself selfish for not wanting to share Kili with anyone, everyone had told him to be nice to his brother and his lover, to be tolerant, to get over it. They might have been right for all that Fili knew, but it didn’t change the fact that it had _hurt_ to have his feelings constantly ignored by his One.

Fili hadn’t tried to really discuss that situation, but then again, neither had Kili. He’d just come home one afternoon, said he’d fallen in love with a young boy and that he would court him. He hadn’t asked for permission, hadn’t asked if Fili had a problem with it. Just stated that things would be like that, because Kili was _wonderful_ , always, but he was used to getting things his way no matter what.

“I was so angry at him that sometimes I almost hated him,” Fili whispered, unsure he was allowed to say that about someone who was dead. “I was furious at him, but I loved him too much to let it show, so I made _you_ pay for it, and I am so _sorry_. You did not deserve that.”

“Kili was not always nice,” Ori replied softly. “He made me angry too. We argued. Lots. I still loved him.”

Clutching tighter to Ori, Fili made a pained noise. He had argued with his brother too, often. About Ori usually, but not always. Sometimes Fili was too controlling and uptight. Or it was Kili who had been too careless and refusing to take his responsibilities. Each of these arguments had terrified Fili, because each time he had feared that Kili would have enough of him, bounded or not, that he would leave… In stories Soulmates never argued, they were one mind in two bodies, and after their worst disputes, Fili had stared at the mark on his wrist for hours, fearing it would disappear.

“What did you argue about?” the prince asked. “How bad were your arguments?”

Ori sighed, and pressed his forehead into the crook of Fili’s neck. He tensed a little, but still held Fili close, and the prince enjoyed that.

“Sometimes, very bad. Broke up _twice_. Not for long, just a few days… I did not like the secrets.”

“You had a secret engagement with him.”

This time Ori pulled away from the hug, breathing fast and flapping his hands. Fili was tempted to catch him again to force him to calm down, but that fell against the rules they had established with Nori.

“It’s okay, I’m not angry!” he said instead, as gently as he could. “Thorin told me, right before Kis’s birth… I don’t mind, I swear. I’m… I _was_ angry when he told me, but I think I’m glad now. Kili didn’t betray me for just _anyone_ , that’s what it means. He… he really was in love, and he was serious about this and… M’al, you made _Kili_ be _serious_ about something, I don’t think you even realize how _impossible_ that is.”

Ori still clenched his hands rhythmically, but he relaxed a little, and gave a crooked smile. Fili smiled back, wishing he could hug his husband again. It felt nice to have Ori close to him, especially when he was thinking of Kili… it made him feel less alone. But the younger dwarf had had too much of a fright when his engagement had been mentioned, and he particularly disliked being touched when he was nervous.

“Thank you for… this,” Fili said with a vague gesture that he hoped would indicate their conversation, and everything that he could share with Ori now. “I’m… thank you, really. I don’t know what I could do for you to show how grateful…”

“Play again,” Ori asked, looking away but smiling almost affectionately. “Please?”

“Anything you want, husband mine,” Fili replied with a smile, his chest feeling too tight.

He picked up the violin again, and played for Ori. Something sweet and tender. If he had been alive, Kili might have played for his lover. But he was dead, so Fili did it for him.

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> aaaaaaaaand with this chapter we hit the end of my buffer  
> I can no longer promise daily updates, between work and my current search for a flat where I don't want to murder everyone around me <3


	16. a present and a favour

Nori was still angry at Fili by the time the second anniversary of the battle of the five armies approched. The prince had not expected for it to last so long (nearly a _month_ now, who knew Nori could hold a grudge that way?) and he had not expected the side effects of it either. Ori was extremely unhappy when he discovered that his sibling had been upset by his husband, and he made a point of ignoring Fili. He even refused to stay at night and listen to the violin.

It made Fili angry at first, because he had done nothing _wrong_. Nori had been the one saying horrors, accusing him of not having really wanted Kili’s happiness, and Fili had only reacted to that. He had tried to explain that to Ori, but his husband had entirely refused to listen.

“Nori always gets angry for a reason,” was all the younger dwarf said, and he was very upset when Fili tried to insist.

Not wanting to have both his friend and his husband against him, Fili relented and wrote a letter to apologize. He had Ori look at it, to make sure it contained nothing that might anger Nori further. That first letter remained unanswered, as did the second one (which Ori helped write, just in case).

The third one _did_ get an answer. Ori and him didn’t know all the words in it, but they assumed that it didn’t sound like something nice, and that it probably wasn’t Nori’s way of making peace.

“You’re good at making people angry,” Ori commented, staring at the letter.

“Yes, thank you, tell me something I don’t know,” Fili grunted. “Ze will change his mind though, won’t ze?”

Ori shrugged uncertainly, but patted Fili on the shoulder to comfort him.

“Ze cannot be so stubborn as to never forgive me, right?” the prince insisted.

As soon as he had said this, Fili grimaced, as did Ori. Nori had a few defects, and stubbornness could be one of them, if ze was provoked.

“Ze likes you,” Ori said with a forced smile. “Ze won’t stay angry.”

The young dwarf sounded as unconvinced as Fili felt, but the prince still smiled back. At least Ori was no longer mad at him, and that was an improvement.

 

The following afternoon, Ori ran into Fili’s office with a small box under his arm. This was rather odd, for more than one reason. First, Kis wasn’t with her father; Ori was no longer so anxious to always keep her with him, but he still rarely left her alone with anyone. Secondly, he had never come into Fili’s office before. With how agitated he looked, it rather worried the prince, who dropped the report he had been reading and leaped from his chair in direction of his husband.

“Is everything right?” Fili asked. “Kis, is she fine? Did anything happen?”

Ori shook his head quickly, and the way he was smiling calmed Fili a little. Ori wouldn’t have managed to fake a smile if anything had been wrong.

“Well, why are you here then? And what’s that you have?”

“Present!” Ori squeaked excitedly. “For Nori! Then ze’ll forgive you!”

The box was shoved into Fili’s arms, and Ori stared at his face with a proud grin that Fili almost wanted to…

The prince pushed that thought away before it was fully formed, and looked down at the box. It was made of beautifully carved wood, and pleasant enough to the eye, but in itself, it had nothing to impress Nori. Carefully, Fili put it on one relatively empty corner of his desk. He then opened it, and gasped.

“Yvanna mother of all,” he whispered reverently. “Ori, this is the most beautiful thing I have ever seen!”

In the box lay a knife with a blade unlike anything Fili had ever seen. There were patterns to it, reminding of the lines seen in wood, a thousand shades of steel. The shape of it was exquisite, and the handle simple, but elegant and perfectly balanced.

“You think Nori might like it?” Ori asked, almost shyly, and Fili realized he must have been silent too long.

“Ze will love it,” the prince murmured. “I had never before seen… where did you find it?”

“Market. Some dwarves have arrived from the east. Were very eager to sell to a prince.”

“You _told_ them you were a prince?” Fili chuckled. “Today is full of surprises if you finally managed to claim that title!”

Ori blushed and looked down.

“They knew already,” he mumbled. “Most people recognise me. I would not have told them, you know I would not…”

“Peace, Ori,” Fili said soothingly, putting his hands on his husband’s shoulders. “I am only teasing. And you are allowed to claim that title. We are married, you will be my consort when I am king, that makes you a prince. Now tell me, how much do I owe you for this knife?”

“Nothing. It’s a present.”

Fili laughed, his hands tightening on Ori’s shoulder, resisting an impulse to hug him.

“If it’s a present from you, I might be tempted to keep it, you know. Come on, give me a price, and I will repay you.”

“Any music I ask for a month,” Ori decided. “And… something I will ask later.”

“Seems fair enough. But you’ll have to come with me to give it to Nori, or ze’ll kill me on the spot."

Ori nodded, really smiling now.

"Can we go now?" The younger dwarf asked. "I have to help your mother with a speech later..."

He seemed so sorry to ask for that favour that Fili's heart clenched. Someday, he promised himself, Ori would no longer be afraid to ask for things, to him or anyone else.

"Let's go now, yes," Fili said, squeezing Ori's shoulders one last time before letting go. "Let's hope your sibling is in a good mood and will let me live."

Ori didn't laugh, but Fili wasn't sure it had been a joke anyway.

 

Nori's innkeeper had strict instructions not to let Fili into her employer's office. Ori was forced to argue with her that the authority of two princes, one of them a beloved little brother in great need of family advice and comfort, and the other a contrite friend, was stronger than an order given in anger. He made himself look so pathetic, the poor woman had tears in her eyes when she went to see if Nori was there.

"I never knew you were such an actor," Fili chuckled softly. "I thought you were going to start crying, and then she would have lost it."

"There are many things you don't know about me," Ori claimed proudly, only blushing a little.

"I hope I'll get to discover them one day, if you'll let me," The prince retorted.

He felt some heat on his cheeks as he said that, and was a little embarrassed,  as if his words had been something very bold. Ori looked at him strangely for a moment, blushing a little more. It was a relief when the innkeeper came back, saying that Nori deigned to see them.

Deigned was the word. Nori glared at Fili the moment he stepped in, and ze seemed unhappy at Ori too.

"I have come to apologise," Fili explained when the door was closed behind them. "I have offended you the other day, and for this I am ever so sorry. You are my friend, and I never wanted to hurt you."

Nori's glare remained unchanged,  and Ori elbowed his husband in the ribs.

"I have... _we_ have a present for you," Fili resumed, holding the box toward Nori. "We hope you will like it. If you don't, I'll gladly keep it."

"Meaning Ori picked it, not you," the akon noted dryly, eyeing the box suspiciously for a moment before opening it. "Bearer of dwarves, that is Blacklock work! And beautiful one at that, it's... That thing must have cost a _fortune_. Who paid for it?"

"I found it but Fili is repaying me," Ori said, which wasn't a lie. It seemed to pacify Nori a bit, but not much.

"Will take more than a pretty knife to be forgiven," ze told Fili. "I treated you as a friend, I fucking _opened up_ to you, and you treated me as a joke."

At last, Fili understood. He'd thought it odd for Nori to be in love, and had not realised it was odder still for him to say so. It had been a mark of trust, and Fili had practically laughed at him.

"I am sorry," the prince said with the utmost sincerity. "I shouldn't have spoken to you the way I did. I will make sure it doesn't happen again."

"Yeah, you're good at apologies at least."

A block of ice hit Fili's stomach. That was too much like something Dori had said once, about people like Naren being good at promises of change.

After hurting Ori so much, he was starting to do the same with Nori.

"I will make efforts! I swear I will, I swear on Kili's memory, I will do my best to never hurt you again!"

Ori took his hand, squeezing it gently. Fili was grateful for it, but all of his attention was on Nori. Ze did not seem too impressed by that outburst, and even less so by hir brother's gesture of comfort.

"So the two of you really are becoming quite the little couple," ze sneered. "You fake it very well, I would believe it if I didn't know better."

"I don't fake friendship," Ori replied coldly. "Never."

A strange gratefulness flooded all over Fili and he squeezed back his husband's hand. He liked that they were friends. He liked any sort of affection he might get from Ori, and friendship already felt more than he deserved. Even if Nori didn't forgive his lack of tact and empathy, he would _still_ have a friend.

But Nori, thankfully, did not look so angry anymore. Resigned maybe, but not angry.

"Don't think that just because my brother likes you, all his forgiven, princeling," ze said. "But the death threat is removed, and I'll call you friend again, since it seems to matter so damn much to you. Don't come again bothering me with fucking emotional question again though, or I swear I'll gut you."

Fili promised. The threat was an empty one though: Nori had been playing with hir pretty new knife as ze said it.

 

Fili had not realised how much he had been pained by this tension with Nori until it was removed. Suddenly, the reports he had to read were not so dry and boring anymore. He had more appetite at dinner, and the energy to play with Kis once Sain had fed her. By the time Ori came back from his meeting with Dis, Fili was laying on the drawing room floor, their daughter cheerfully climbing all over him. It was a game she always adored, and a free massage for him, Fili liked to joke. Sometimes the massage was rougher than he would have liked, but she was laughing so much he couldn't mind.

Ori joined them of course, dangling the end of his belt in front of Kis. Sometimes she caught it and sometimes she didn't, but she seemed to greatly enjoy that game too. It got her worked up though, and Fili had to play for her when bedtime came.

"I wonder if she'll want to learn the violin when she's older," the prince mused once he was alone with Ori. "It runs in her blood... or maybe she'll be more like you, an artist..."

"She tried to eat my charcoal last week," Ori replied.

"Could mean she'll want to draw. Or that she hates it. Or that her teeth are coming."

Ori nodded but kept silent. He was nervously playing with his leather bracelet, which rarely was good news.

"Is there any problem?" Fili asked carefully. "Did something happen while you were with my mother? Is it about the celebration?"

The younger dwarf quickly shook his head, hesitated for a second, and then nodded.

"About the celebration," he confirmed. "And earlier. I said... I said... I said I wanted a favour, right?"

"And you shall have it, whatever it is."

"Yes. I w... I want... I... would y..."

The words refused to get out, and Ori bit his lip in frustration, his face crimson in embarrassment.

"Try Iglishmek?" Fili suggested, and the other dwarf nodded.

/Sleep with me the night of the anniversary of the battle, please?/

Fili sputtered as he tried to process that demand. He was trying to refuse because that sort of intimacy had never interested him, because Ori had been his brother's lover, because that sort of things could only go wrong and should never have been suggested in the first place.

And yet there was something in it, the idea of holding Ori close in his arms, a longing for closeness...

"No!" Ori squeaked nervously. /Not as lovers! Just sleeping! We slept together last year and it helped. I don't want to feel alone, not on that night. I don't think you should be alone either./

Fili had been blushing before; his cheeks burnt even hotter now, in shame for thinking so badly of Ori, and for having wanted it a little. For that reason alone he should have refused, but Ori was right. It was not a night they should spend alone, and their only other option was a great feast that Fili hated already and which would tire Ori with its noises and smells.

"Let us sleep together then," Fili said with an uncertain smile. "I've been told I steal the covers though, be warned."

"I kick," Ori replied shyly.

That made Fili laugh, and Ori soon joined him.

It would be odd, sleeping in the same bed as someone who wasn’t Kili, and Fili would not have considered it with anyone else...

But this wasn't just anyone. It was _Ori_.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> the knife has a damascus blade. They are particularly beautiful, and were extremelly strong.


	17. new habits

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Fili and Ori wake up together  
> and Fili receives a letter

Fili was only starting to wake up when something jumped on his back, exactly where it hurt the most. He groaned in protest, and was answered by a laugh, then the sound of someone apologising. Ori had let Kis on the bed then, but had not thought of telling her that it was impolite to wake people up after a party.

Not that Fili had drunk a lot that time. He had been mostly sober for the whole ceremony in memory of the battle of the five armies. He had been tempted, but the thought of being drunk in Ori's bed had been distasteful. He half suspected that Narn, his husband's grandfather, was a drunk, and did not like that Ori might compare them. But it had still been a long day, and he was tired, so he tried to go back to sleep.

That was in vain. Kis was very obviously delighted to have both her fathers at her disposal, and she intended to enjoy that lucky morning. Fili soon gave up on sleep, and instead tickled his daughter. He was pleased to notice that she was as sensitive as Kili had been, laughing and giggling at the smallest touch. Ori was looking at them, lying on his side with a sleepy smile. He was fighting to keep his eyes open, which Fili found most unfair. If he wasn't allowed to sleep in, no one was; he reached over to Ori to tickle his side too.

Ori just smiled wider.

"Won't work there," he proudly explained. "Not ticklish."

That was the most unfair thing of them all, and Fili wanted to say so. His protest was cut short by Ori's hands just above his hips, scratching lightly. 

The sound Fili made was neither princely nor dignified, but he couldn't help himself. 

It was cruel and low of Ori to have attacked him like that, he decided. It was never easy to protect oneself against tickles, but he had to mind Kis who was still half sprawled over him. She was, more than ever, delighted by that unusual morning, and she giggled at her father's situation. Fili was only saved when Sain came in for hir morning routine. Ze did not seem too surprised to have to get Kis from Ori's room, but ze stopped for a second at the sight of Fili.

"Good morning, your highness."

"Good morning, Sain. How was Kis last night?"

The nurse smiled, glancing at Fili. He was wearing a night shirt, but in his games with Kis and Ori, the shirt had fallen out of place and his chest was out in the open. There wasn’t a lot more to see than if he had been male, but the prince still tried to make himself a little more decent.

"She missed you and lord Ori, but fine otherwise."

"Wonderful," Fili managed to say, feeling decidedly uncomfortable. "Great.”

He watched as Sain took away Kis to clean and dress her, and groaned miserably when ze closed the door.

Sain of all people knew that Ori never slept with his husband. Or at least, that they never spent the entire night together. Such a change to their routine would be noticed, and if Sain had never gossiped before ze might do it now. It was not bad gossip as such that a prince and his husband shared a bed. It might even be seen as a good thing, especially with no bound between them. But all gossips arrived to Nori’s ears sooner or later, and if ze thought that Fili had been inappropriate with hir brother…

“Hungover?” Ori asked with a frown.

“Just worried. If Sain talks, Nori will kill me. Slowly and painfully. He’ll think I took advantage of you.”

Ori looked at him for a moment, and started laughing so hard that he almost fell from the bed. Fili had to catch him and pull him up before he could hurt himself. Even there, against the prince’s chest, Ori was still laughing.

“You could not force me,” he said once he had calmed down a little. “It’s not you."

“Thank you for your trust."

Ori smiled, and touched his cheek.

"You're not a monster."

"Thank you," Fili repeated, raising his hand to take Ori's. He froze when his finger met leather, and chuckled. "Do you never take off that bracelet then?"

Instantly Ori's hand left his cheek, and the younger dwarf curled up on himself, looking away. That was a more intense reaction than Fili had expected, and he renounced teasing.

Refraining his curiosity was less easy.

"What is it then? I think I've never seen you without it since you came to live here."

"Nothing," Ori mumbled. "Nothing. Nothing..."

"So you just think it looks nice? I could get you something prettier you know. Even in leather, I could give you something better fitted for a prince, with decorations and..."

"Don't want pretty," Ori said slowly, forcing each word out of his throat. "Old... scars. Wanna... forget."

Not so long ago, Fili might have pushed for an explanation. Even then, he was curious. But Ori was curled up on himself and rocking slightly, looking away from both his husband and his bracelet, when a few minutes earlier he had been so relaxed and open. It had been a long while since Fili had seen him so nervous, and so he did not insist.

"I'd better go to my room and get dressed," the prince said, trying to keep his tone light. "Uncle wants to talk about the plans for Northern Mirkwood this morning, and he'll expect me to be on time, celebration or not."

There was no reaction from Ori then, nor when he jumped off the bed and left the room. At breakfast though, with kis in his arms, the younger dwarf was back to a better mood, and even seemed merrier than usual. Fili commented on that, and Ori made a small grimace. 

"No nightmares," he explained.

"Do you often have bad dreams then?"

"Every night," Ori confessed, resigned. "But not last night. Not last year either. And not with Kili."

"Only when you're alone then."

There was something heart breaking in the way Ori nodded, a sort of sad acceptance that he would never get a decent night of sleep again. But Fili too had slept better that night. He was not plagued by nightmares, but he had so often slept near Kili that being alone still felt odd.

"We should sleep together sometimes," Fili suggested. "I think I'm more rested too."

It was a bold proposal, and Ori stared at him in shock. The younger dwarf didn't answer straight away, pondering the question as he finished feeding Kis. She was starting to eat vegetables mashed, but she still needed milk. Fili was careful not to look, if he could avoid it. It was a moment between Ori and his child. 

"No more than three times a week," Ori said when Kis was sated. "I need time alone. I get unwell around people."

"So that's a yes then?"

Ori nodded with a slight blush. Fili was almost sure his cheeks too were pink, though there was no reason for it. They were friends, offering each other friendly comfort. Nothing more.

  
  


It should have been strange, sleeping with Ori, but it wasn't. The young dwarf moved in his sleep, perhaps more than in his waking hours, but he was not as bad as Kili.

"Oh, he's the worst," Ori laughed the morning Fili told him that.

The prince did not ask when Ori had had occasion to sleep next to Kili, but he was tempted. He had never known such a thing had happened. Maybe his brother had just been terrible, that night Kis had been conceived... but no, Kili had slept near him that night, whatever he'd done with Ori before that. If they had slept together it had been before that, and Fili didn't want to think of it.

He had happier things to consider. The joy of being frequently woken up by Kis, for example. He'd had to tell Ori that he didn't mind, because the younger dwarf was so worried about disturbing his sleep. A few minutes less of sleep were a small price to pay when he could play with Kis much more often now. Beside, he slept better next to Ori, so it was not a problem.

Fili felt happy.

  
  


He would have been happier still if Dwalin had stopped pestering him with his theory that he loved Ori.

It had probably been nothing more than a joke at first, Fili now realised. Dwalin had noticed his embarrassment though, and had decided that teasing him was a fun game. Old people had a bizarre sense of fun sometimes. It started with just small things, hints and double-entendre that had Fili blushing. If Ori was around they made him uncomfortable, but he never complained. Fili tried to ask Dwalin to stop, but the old dwarf thought he was trying to escape the teasing. He tried to beg his uncle for help, but Thorin claimed to be powerless. 

"Let Dwalin say whatever nonsense pleases him," the king advised. "It is a sign of good health in him, and it will help with our official story about the marriage. I imagine such taunts are not pleasant for you, but bear with them. You know there is no truth in them, isn't that enough?"

Fili agreed reluctantly, but he still blushed every time Dwalin made a joke. Because they were unpleasant to Ori, he told himself, and because Dori and Nori often glared at him these days.

He had not survived their  _ legitimate _ anger to be murdered  _ now _ , over a few horrible puns.

  
  


Their new sleeping arrangement had been in place for a few weeks when Fili received a letter from Naren and Ari, requesting the permission to meet their son.

He almost threw away the letter right there and then. What Ori didn't know wouldn't hurt him, whereas an encounter with his father certainly would. At the same time, he would not like being treated as if his opinion didn't matter. Making his decisions for him would have made Fili just as bad as Naren. So he kept the letter, and when Kis was in bed, he gave it to Ori.

The effect was immediate. Ori paled and froze as soon as he recognised the writing. If he had not been sitting in a chair, he might have collapsed. He did not read the letter, and instead turned to Fili.

/what does he want?/ he signed with shaky hands, the letter dropped on his lap.

"To meet you. Your mother, too. But you don't have to! If you say no, I will tell him. If you want me not to tell you if you ask again, I can do it again. And if you decide to meet them, I can be with you, or my mother, or anyone you like. I'm not sure you should be alone with them, but if you choose to, then we'll do that. You are in control, okay?"

Ori held out his hand toward Fili, hesitantly. The prince took it without a moment of doubt, and without thinking pressed a kiss to the back of it.

"You're not alone anymore, Ori," he whispered. "We can help you, and we will."

" _ Hate him _ ," Ori confessed softly, as if he were letting go of some great secret.

Maybe it was to him. If Fili had needed so long just to realise how _angry_ he'd been at his brother, he couldn't blame Ori for taking some time to figure out that he _could_ hate his father.

"He is a very bad man," Fili agreed. "And he hurt you and your family a lot. I hate him too for what he did to you and your siblings, and the way he spoke of Kis."

It seemed to comfort Ori to know that his dislike was shared. Without letting go of Fili's hand, he took again the letter and started reading.

"Mother is with child," Ori whispered.

"Where does it say so?"

"She is unwell in the stomach. Means she is pregnant but we're not allowed to say it in case the baby doesn't live. They never do. He will be angry at her again."

Fili wanted to ask how often his mother had been with child that he could so easily recognise the true meaning of that sentence. He wanted to know how Naren's anger expressed itself, and how old Ari was, that she might still bear. Even if she'd had Dori young, it certainly couldn't be safe anymore at her age. He wanted to ask so many things, but that would only have distressed Ori more.

"You don't have to see them if you don't want to," he said instead, squeezing his husband's hand. "No one will blame you."

"They will," Ori replied, looking at the letter. "When the baby die. My fault.  _ Always _ my fault."

"You know it's not really your fault."

Ori shrugged, and removed his hand from Fili's.

/I will see them,/ he signed. /Maybe this time I can help./

Nothing could help a bearer too old to have children, Fili wanted to shout. Nothing could help someone who did not want to be helped, and Ari certainly didn't, or she would have left her husband long ago.

"They are not coming anywhere near Kis," Fili warned.

Ori shot him an offended look. Of course they would not meet Kis, he seemed to say. He might have been sentimental, but he wasn't a fool.

"Where do you want to meet them? Here? Or I could find a nice, quiet place where you won't be disturbed."

"We," Ori corrected.

"We," Fili agreed. "Somewhere else then?"

It was a relief to see Ori nod. Fili did not want to think of Naren inside their home. The happiness they had managed to reach was fragile enough, he did not want to risk bad memories tainting it.

They decided that Kis would be sent with her grandmother during that encounter, or stay with Sain if Dis was not available. Fili tried to hint again that Ori had no obligation to meet his parents.  He stopped when he saw how that upset his husband. The choice had been hard enough without someone questioning it.

"Promise you'll stay calm," Ori begged. "Unless I say you can get angry."

"But you can't talk when you're upset. And seeing you upset will make me angry."

Ori considered that for a moment. 

"I'll say Kili's name," Ori suggested. "Then you'll know."

"But if you can't talk? I've made you feel bad often enough to know how you get, Ori. I don't want to make it worse but exploding at the wrong moment,  but I don't want to let him hurt you past what you can endure either."

"I  _ will _ say his name," Ori stubbornly repeated. "I can. Trust me?"

It was not a matter of trust but of experience. Experience and things that Ori could not do. But Fili agreed all the same. Experience, again, told him that his husband would not change his mind.

Ori had his pride, like any dwarf.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I don't know where this is going but it's going there: the fic


	18. family reunion

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Ori and Fili meet Ori's parents again

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> warning for Fili being an utter little shit (and an ableist one at that)

Naren was extremely polite when he arrived. He congratulated Ori for how healthy he looked, and Fili for a new deal with the men of Dale. He looked terribly glad to be there, and only regretted Kis's absence. Ari looked tired and thin, but she too seemed happy to see her son after more than a year. She also wished she could have seen her granddaughter, and she sounded more sincere than her husband.

"Maybe another time," Fili promised. "This was the only free spot in our schedule, and we had already promised my mother she would have Kis this afternoon."

Not his best lie, but they were gracious enough to pretend they believed it. Fili would have preferred Naren to call him out on that week excuse. Such willingness had to be hiding something.

"Is she growing well at least?" He asked. "We want to make sure our first grandchild is healthy."

"She is starting to walk," Ori mumbled.

"And talk? Got to mind the talking, son. _You_ talked late. Might be like you."

Fili clenched his fists. Suddenly, his promise to stay calm felt impossible to keep. Still, he tried, for Ori's sake.

"I rather hope she will be like him," the prince claimed proudly. "Ori is patient, curious and just... good qualities for a future queen, I would say."

"A queen? Thought it was traditional in here to make the heir be a boy when they came of age. Don't think there's ever been anything but _kings_ on the throne of Erebor."

The attack hit closer to home than Naren must have expected. Thorin had not called himself a man until the tragedy of Azanulbizar, and Fili himself… Kili, too, had sometimes hinted that he was not fully comfortable as a man, but sacrifices had to be made.

Queens and sovereigns were the best rulers in time of peace, but when war was a risk, people wanted a king... and the Longbeard had never truly been at peace since the loss of Khazad dum.

"Kis will be the first queen then," Fili replied, smiling coldly. "Or anything she wishes to be called. I can promise you that we don't want to turn her into someone she is not. It is such a cruel thing to force your expectation on your child."

The kick in the shin he got from Ori was deserved, but Fili did not care. He had promised to stay calm, not to be nice.

“We all want what’s best for the kids,” Naren dared to reply, smiling as if he were truly convinced of that. “Part of why we’re here, of course. We had to make sure our boy is all fine, right? But he looks fine. Getting a little round maybe. Guess you’re feeding him right. It’s a good thing, no one want a bearer with just skin and bone, eh?  You can’t bear children properly when you don’t have meat of your own.”

Ari shifted uncomfortably, and Ori tensed.

“I’m too young for more children,” he whispered angrily.

“Who said that? Doctors? Nonsense!” Naren turned to Fili, and winked at him. “They always say they can’t bear, it’s a family thing, but don’t you believe that. You’ve got to get as many kids as you can before he turns barren. Ori will do his duty for the kingdom, won’t he? Just give the order, and he’ll do it, don’t worry.”

Nausea rose as Fili realised that this was certainly Naren’s attempt at being friendly with him. Was that what people thought of him then, that he was the sort of person who would take someone by force (and giving an order _was_ using force, Dis had made sure her sons knew that) just to ensure the future of the royal family? The very thought made him sick.

He turned to Ori, silently begging for permission to get angry, but his husband imperceptibly shook his head.

“Ori will be the one to decide if we ever have more children,” Fili said, barely managing to keep his voice even. “And if he decides we are to have more, he will also decide when. _That_ is how things are done in Erebor.”

For a moment, Naren’s fake good mood faltered, and he glared at Fili. It didn’t last long, but it felt like a victory.

If his father in law became angry and aggressive, certainly Fili would be excused for getting angry too, wouldn’t he?

“Of course it is,” Naren politely replied. “Would have to be a monster to do otherwise. I was just testing you, highness, if you’ll forgive me. We hear story sometimes, and a body gets scared for his only son, you know? Well, of course, maybe he won’t be the only one for long, if we’re lucky, eh?”

He turned toward his wife then, and Ari smiled. It was the same smile Ori had when he knew it was expected of him but he couldn’t really figure out why.

“I am with child,” she said quietly to her son. “I’ve seen a doctor, and she said that with the proper care, and with enough quiet, I might bear that one to term. But I will need a lot of medicine, and I have only a few weeks left before I must keep to bed at all times… we are going to need some help at home, and…”

“Dori won’t help us,” Naren cut her. “He’s always been a miser, but now we have to beg for every single coin. Making conditions to help us. We need you, Ori. Your unborn brother needs you.”

Ori frowned, and dared to glance up at his father. Fili had rarely seen his husband look so angry, and Ori was clearly trying to prepare himself to speak. The prince decided to help with that.

“What sort of restrictions did Dori put then?” he asked. “Doesn’t sound like him to just give up on family.”

What little attention had been on Ori until that point shifted toward Fili. Even Ari was no longer looking at her son.

“Dori wants to… take some extreme measures to make sure the baby and I are fine,” she explained.

“He’s bought a house and wants her to go live there with him until delivery,” Naren interrupted. “Just the two of them, and some servants. He wants to take a wife from her husband, and that’s not fine. I’ve got rights over that baby, highness. You must understand, that, eh?”

Fili pinched his lips. A glance told him that Ori too was upset, looking for words again.

“Why would it be so bad?” Fili asked before his husband could find his voice. “She would get to be somewhere quiet, it would be perfect for the baby, and I’m sure Dori would let you visit.”

“What, when he’s never accepted that his mother remarried?” Naren spat. “He’d rather let us and the babe starve and die than to help her if it means helping me. Never could bear that she’d debase herself with a Broadbeam like me.”

“You’re _mean_ to her,” Ori accused in a hard voice.

That only made Naren snigger, as if he’d said something cute.

“Son, you don’t know what it was like to be an adult in Ered Luin. You’ve had it easy all your life. You wouldn’t understand. I only tried to help your mother, didn’t I?”

“There are other ways to help someone than to shout at them or insult them,” Fili retorted, putting one arm around Ori’s shoulder. He’d meant to look protective, but his husband tensed and very obviously had to make an effort not to push him away, so Fili removed his arm. “Look, I think we should trust Dori on this. He has seen you pregnant more often than any of us, Ari, and I know he is not one to take decisions lightly. You two should talk to him about this, not us. Right, Ori?”

The younger dwarf shrugged, looking angry, and Fili took that for agreement.

“Now,” the prince resumed, “if you have anything else to discuss, we will be glad to…”

“No, you’ve said enough,” Naren grunted, raising from his chair and pulling his wife up. “If the child is lost, we’ll know who to blame at least. Good day, your highness, and thanks for nothing.”

He pushed his wife toward the door then, forcing her to leave before she could say goodbye to Ori. They did not even close the door behind them, so Fili had to go and do it for them.

“Well, that could have been better,” he sighed.

Ori tapped on his shoulder then, and when Fili turned, his husband looked even more furious than he had in front of his father.

/You cannot do that!/ he signed with shaking hands. /You cannot speak for me! Not if I don’t ask you to!/

“I just wanted to help!”

/If I need help, I will ask for it. I can fight my own battles! You cannot speak for me, you cannot pretend to know what I’m thinking without asking! I can stand my ground!/

“Yeah, I’ve seen that,” Fili grunted harshly, unsure why he was getting scolded that way. “I’ve seen you with your father before, and I’ve been quite struck by the way you stood up against him. _I_ can talk, and I can tell him what needs to be told, so it’s much easier if I do it.”

All of Ori’s body was shaking with anger now, and he was struggling to keep his hand still enough to sign. He still tried a few times, positioning his fingers, but each time a new surge of anger has him flapping his hands and stomping.

“No!” he shouted, when nothing else worked. “No, no, no! _No_!”

With words failing him, Ori roughly pushed his husband, hard enough to make Fili stumble. He ran to his room after, and slammed the door behind him hard enough to make the walls shake.

Fili just stood there, unsure what to do. He didn’t understand Ori’s anger, still convinced that he had done the right thing, the _only_ thing possible… He had done it to help, to make sure Ori wouldn’t be in presence of that monster who called himself a father for longer than necessary, and surely that must have been a good thing? He had done it to help, to protect Ori… and all it got him in return was anger and aggressivity. Which made him angry in turn, and he wished that Ori could have explained what he’d done wrong, because he had no idea. He was half tempted to go to his husband’s room and demand an explanation… but that would mean getting into an argument, and Ori getting even angrier which wouldn’t help him sign or talk.

So instead Fili left their apartments, and went to get their daughter.

 

Fili stayed with his mother longer than he had intended. He was not particularly eager to go home and talk to Ori about what had happened. One straining conversation was bad enough for one day. In the end, Fili sent home a servant to warn his husband that he would be eating with Dis that night. By the time he got home, Kis was sleeping in his arms.

It had never bothered Fili before that the only way to the nursery went through Ori’s room, but it now struck him as a serious architectural fault. Thankfully, the younger dwarf seemed to be asleep when Fili went to put the baby to bed, and he didn’t move either when the prince went back in the main room.

When he decided to go to sleep too, Fili found an envelope on his bed, with his name in Ori’s neat and precise handwriting.

 

_Dear Fili,_

 

_Since you seemed so confused at my anger, let me explain here what caused it. Just because I have trouble speaking doesn’t allow you to do it for me, not unless I ask you to help me. I am perfectly capable of asking for help when I need it, as your mother or Nori will confirm._

_Granted, sometimes it’s hard for me to ask for help, when I am nervous. Do you know what you can do when that happens? You can ask me if I need help, instead of assuming I cannot get by without you to save me._

_And for the record, I could have handled this. I decided to see my father because I wanted to handle it. I have never before been in a situation where I could demand to be treated as an equal, but I am now._

_When you came to ask for my hand, I was terrified that he might refuse to let me go just out of spite. He would have done it, if he’d thought it made any real difference to me, if he thought I might be happy… which frankly, I did not expect to be. I was leaving one bad house for another, I thought, so excuse me for not having been very enthusiastic about anything that day. As for the other time, I’d just had an entire argument with adad over his insults to you and Kis. I was tired, and then you came in and I was terrified because I thought if I did anything wrong, I was going to lose my daughter._

_I don’t fear that anymore. I’m not afraid to make adad angry, nor you. I can fight my fights, and if it takes me longer than you to find the words, then you’ll just have to wait until I manage to say them. If Kili managed to be patient when I had trouble speaking, then certainly so can you._

_These are my parents, Fili. They might not be the best there ever was, but they are still my parents, and if they come asking for my help, I should be the one to decide whether I help them or not! So we’re going to talk about this, and I am going to write to them, because I actually want to help amad have her baby fine. It means a lot to her, and I think it might be easier to help her leave adad, if she’s not doing it just for herself. Nori told me once that she almost left sometimes when I was a baby, but she couldn’t take care of hir and me. Well, she has Dori and Nori and me to help now, and we are the richest dwarves in the kingdom, so certainly, we can save our amad. I don’t need your help, but if you want to help, you are welcome to do it, as long as it is on my terms._

 

_Sincerly,_

_Ori_

 

It was not the first time Fili felt ashamed of misplaced pride concerning the way he was handling things with Ori, but he sincerely hoped it would be the last. he’d thought he was helping, but he’d just managed to be a complete prick once more, treating Ori with the same condescending attitude that Naren had used.

That meant more excuses to make, and that they would need a real conversation, to make sure he did not again treat Ori as less than he was.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I have been frustrated as heck that Ori's voice wasn't heard more in this fic. I don't think you can imagine how often I want to slap Fili in the face  
> also, you might notice that this fic is now part of a series. As I've said, I've been pretty frustrated with Fili's treatment of Ori, and I had an intense need to show that Ori is so much more than what he husband believes, so I've started writing the romance of Ori and Kili in Ered Luin uwu


	19. new mission

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Fili is given a new job, and makes a promise to Ori

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry for how long it took me to update this! I... sort of... couldn't feel the characters anymore (they're not fully back yet, but I'm fighting through that nasty block nonetheless)  
> (sorry that this chapter is of lower quality as a result)

There was a heavy silence at their breakfast table the following morning. Fili was trying to find the words to explain that he’d never meant to do anything wrong, that he had so sincerely tried to help and make things easier for Ori. But nothing he could think of felt right. He could sweet talk nobles, he could negotiate with the most hardened of guild masters and it was easy, but Ori made him feel clumsy.

It didn’t help that the younger dwarf was not looking at him, all of his attention on Kis. Fili supposed he could count himself lucky that his husband was having breakfast with him at all.

“I’m sorry,” Ori said shyly when Kis was done eating. “Shouldn’t have gotten angry like that. You were trying to help… not the right way, but _trying_. I _like_ that you try.”

“Yes, well, I’m sorry I don’t do a lot more than try,” Fili sighed. “Sometimes it feels like I’ll never get things right.”

Ori tilted his head a little, and looked at Fili as if he weren’t making any sense. The younger dwarf then got up from his chair, and gave Kis to his husband.

“You get things right,” he said, looking at the baby now giggling on Fili’s lap. “Often.”

Fili’s arms tightened a little around their daughter… and she was theirs now. Kili might have sired her, but Fili loved her as if she were his own flesh and blood, and Ori trusted him with her now. He still did not trust a lot of people around his daughter, but he trusted _Fili_.

“We’ll have to talk about last night,” the prince still said, and Ori nodded. “I want to understand what I did wrong. And we need to figure out a system to communicate without talking out loud. I had one with Kili, and my mother and uncle have one too. Mostly we used it at classes or councils to complain, but… that way you could tell me to shut up without words, and…”

“You could give advice,” Ori suggested, flapping his hands excitedly. “At parties. You _always_ know what to do!”

“You’re not so bad at parties anymore,” Fili protested.

“You’re not so bad around me anymore,” Ori replied.

That made Fili grin, happier than he would have expected to know that his efforts were noticed and appreciated.

“Tonight, we’ll talk about what I did wrong,” he still insisted. “There’s been times when I was trying to hurt you, but this time I really thought I was acting nice, and I want to _understand_.”

“Tonight,” Ori agreed, taking Kis back. “Not now. You’ll be late for council.”

Fili cursed at that, because he’d forgotten he had obligations that morning. Kis went back to Ori’s arms. Fili half choked on a toast, and then ran out of the room.

 

He was not late to the council, but only barely. he had had only Ori in mind the whole way there, but as soon as he sat down, Fili had to tune out any thought of his husband. That morning they were discussing the portion of Mirkwood that had been attached to Erebor by treaty, and what they ought to do with it now that they had it. Some members of the council thought that hunters should be sent there, nothing more, but that opinion was not the majority.

“There’s spiders in that forest,” Gloin said, and ze glared when someone sniggered. “Yes, it’s easy to laugh! They’re taller than an elf, and vicious! Almost killed us, they did, and the elves themselves had to be careful with them. Why do you think they’re giving us some of their precious trees? The place is probably crawling with spiders and worse things. I’ll be surprised if any hunter we send there comes back at all.”

“I’ve thought about that too,” Thorin admitted. “What would you suggest we do?”

“Clean the place from vermin. There’s a few warriors who are getting bored from reconstruction work, and there’s one or two petty criminals that would take any second chance they’re give. We send them there, establish camps, make sure there’s a safe perimeter to hunt into.”

Thorin nodded, and turned toward Balin who nodded too.

“We could ask my brother to recruit people. It’d be a good chance for any young dwarf trying to prove themselves. We will have to start small, and they will have to be lead by someone who knows to be careful… they’ll need a healer or two. Might need to have a chat with the elves to see if they have anyone they can spare, someone who knows the woods and the spiders.”

There was some grumbling at the idea of working with elves, especially from Thorin, but Fili supported the idea, as did Bifur and Dori. They were not very keen on dealing with the tall ones, but they remembered the spiders too well to take risks.

“I give it a month before the first dwarves go there,” Thorin decided. “Fili, you will be in charge of the whole thing. You will make sure that everything needed for a temporary camp is available to them, and you will go with them to look over the first few weeks of the operation. You will report to me as often as possible, and see what supplies will be needed to make the temporary camp permanent… supposing that we can indeed work in the forest. If it proves too dangerous, then we will not insist, and figure out what to do with Thranduil’s poisonous gift.”

“I am honoured by your trust, uncle,” Fili said, knowing it was expected of him. “I will do my best not to disappoint.”

The discussion then shifted to the funding to be allotted for that mission. The treasury was full, certainly, but releasing too much of that gold into Erebor and the surrounding region might only devalue it. At the same time, they had to make sure that whoever would join this special corp would have a reason to do so, and a good pay was always motivating. And when at last they were done talking about money, they had to decide how many people could enroll, for how long, what criteria should be applied (no one with a family at charge, they determined, not unless they could prove that the family would be provided for) and many other things that Fili would have to discuss again with Dwalin anyway. It was past lunch time when they finished, and then, Thorin asked his nephew to stay with him a little more.

“I am sorry for thrusting this on you without warning,” Thorin said. “I had planned on asking Dwalin, but he has too much on his hands already with the watch, and I thought some time away from Erebor might do you good. You work a lot, you deserve a break.”

“A break with giant spiders and Mahal knows what horrors?”

Thorin grimaced, but Fili chuckled.

“I suppose that’s always better than paperwork. And I do miss doing things. I haven’t touched a blade in… months, if not more. Not really since...”

He trailed off, and Thorin patted him on the shoulder.

He had loved fighting, once. This and music had been the most fun he could have, back in Ered Luin, but without Kili, training did not feel the same. He needed something to cheer on him when he did good, and to mercilessly mock him when he messed up. But if he had learned to play the violin without Kili to hear it, maybe it was time he trained again.

And maybe this time he would get good enough to never again lose anyone.

“It will be a good chance for you to see how you deal with leading a troop and being in charge of supplies and security. I know you will do great, nephew.”

“Training to be king,” Fili sighed. “And here I was hoping for some quiet holidays among giant spiders and monsters, but no, there’s a catch of course.”

Thorin looked ready to protest, but the prince smirked and they both laughed.

 

Fili’s afternoon was just as busy as his morning, between talking to Dwalin to determine what the spider corp might need and who should be in it, and making the first few orders of materials. He still managed to find a half hour to go to the training ground, only to discover that he’d gone even more rusty than he’d feared. That would be something to work on.

It wasn’t until he arrived home, tired and sore in ways he hadn’t been in months and he saw Kis and Ori playing on the carpet, that Fili realized he wouldn’t be seeing them for days at an end, maybe even weeks or _months_ depending on how things went. His daughter and his friend… his husband, and he would no longer see them every morning. And who would sleep with Ori, to keep his nightmares away? Who would tickle Kis and make sure she laughed at least once every morning?

No one with a family at charge could enter the spider corp, they’d decided, but no one had seemed to care that Fili too had one.

Ori noticed him after a while, and frowned.

“You look awful,” the younger dwarf said. “Why do you stay in the doorway? Kis wants to play.”

Without thought Fili moved to join them, and sat down so that the baby could climb on him. Kis was walking well now, and soon she would start talking, and he was going to miss that. He had missed her first birthday, and he would miss her first steps. His daughter, his niece, the only child he’d ever have, and he was going to miss everything important in her life.

A hand on his shoulder startled him, and Ori quickly removed it, looking so worried Fili felt almost guilty. He made himself smile, and tried not to think how much he wanted to hug his husband and hold him close. If he took Ori in his arms now, he wasn’t sure he would ever let go.

“I’m fine,” he said instead. “It’s just… something happened at council this morning, and… you know that part of the forest that Thranduil gave us? We’re… going to establish a camp there, for hunting. But first we need to cleanse it from spiders and…”

“No,” Ori whispered. “No.”

“There might  not even be spiders at all,” Fili quickly said, grabbing Kis as she tried to climb on his back. “The came from the South after all, and we’re not sure they ever came that far north. Beside I’ll probably mostly stay on the edge to supervise things, so there’s not much risk for me, and…”

“ _No_.”

“Even if something happens to me, mother and uncle will take care of Kis and you, and…”

“NO!” Ori cried, tears forming at the corner of his eyes. “No. You can’t die!”

Kis escaped from Fili’s arms to climb on Ori’s lap, and her father held her close, as if he feared she too would go away. Fili could no longer resist and he put his arms around Ori’s shoulders, pulling him close.

“I’ll be careful,” he promised. “I’m going there to make sure nobody takes unneeded risks, so I have to be careful, right? I’ll be so careful, I promise I won’t die.”

“Kili promised,” came the whispered answer.

He had promised them both then, and betrayed both his promises.

“Look at me,” Fili ordered, pulling back. “Look at my face. Am I my brother?”

The request surprised Ori enough that he stopped crying and actually looked at the prince as he shook his head.

“That’s right, I’m not him. I’m the _other_ brother. The one who’s not nice, the one who doesn’t always understand you, and who’s selfish and mean but you know what else I am?”

“What?”

“I’m the brother who keeps his promises. The brother who _lived_. And if I survived losing Kili then I will survive anything in the world, I promise you that. So don’t worry about me. I’ll be fine. I promise you I’ll be fine. You have to trust me on this, I’ll be fine. Do you trust me?”

There was not even a second of hesitation before Ori nodded.

“Good. So I promise you, nothing will happen to me. I don’t want to make Kis even more of an orphan, and I don’t want to leave you alone. I love you both too much for that, right?

The last was said while looking at Kis, with a big smile to comfort her. She was on the verge of crying too, but seeing her father smile did help a little. She only smiled herself when Ori kissed the top of her head.

“When will dinner be served?” Fili asked, lying down on his back.

Kis escaped from her father’s arms to come and climb on the prince’s stomach, giggling as she did so, all fears forgotten for a moment.

“Half hour,” Ori replied, agitating a small cloth doll in front of their daughter. “Chicken and mushrooms tonight.”

“Oh, that’s great. I like mushrooms.”

“I know. I asked for them.”

Fili smiled, and Ori smiled back.

He would come back.

He would kill every single spider in Mirkwood with his bare hands if it came to it, but he would survive and he would come back.

He was the brother who kept his promises after all.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> concerning the council: Balin was already part of it in Ered Luin (and his father was too in Erebor), but the eldest of all families who took part in the quest were also granted a seat (Oin sends his sibling because he's too busy saving lives)


	20. the edge of the forest

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Fili makes another promise to Ori, and goes to Mirkwood

 

The preparations for that trip to Mirkwood changed Fili’s habits more than he would have liked. Most days he only saw Kis in the mornings, only coming home after she’d gone to bed. He had little more time for Ori, too exhausted by everything he had to organise and his training sessions to do anything but eat and go to bed. He missed playing the violin, and the quiet moments of silence they shared, but there was nothing he could do about it.

The only compensation he got out of it was that Ori asked him if they could sleep together until he left. A request that was easily granted. Fili wasn’t sure what to make of the fact that a couple time, they were clinging to each other when he woke up. He had little experience in the subject, but it didn’t seem like something friends did. Then again, most friends were not married and regularly sharing a bed. Friend did not notice how soft the other’s skin was where it made contact with their own, either, and they did not think about how pretty the other was.

Fili did not have these thoughts often either, of course. Just in the morning, when he was not awake enough to know not to think such silly things. But just these few seconds were enough to leave him confused or irritated for the day.

Maybe it wasn’t just fear of the spiders that made him train so hard each day. Being exhausted at night meant he was sure not to say anything strange to Ori, and he was usually asleep too fast to notice anything about the dwarf holding him.

Because of this, they did not manage to have a real conversation until the night before Fili was due to leave. He’d had no excuse that day. Thorin had sent him home to make sure everything he needed was packed, and so that he could say goodbye to his daughter and husband. Kis had been delighted to finally play with him again, but Ori had been oddly silent. _Far_ more than usual.

“I’m only going for a month for now,” Fili tried to comfort him when they were alone. “Just a month, and I’ll make sure to keep safe. I’ve promised you, haven’t I?”

Ori nodded, playing nervously with his leather bracelet. The skin around it had been scratched red during the day, and when the young dwarf started scratching again, Fili pulled him in a hug.

“I’ll be safe, I promise. I’m not going alone, there are good warriors to help me… and there’s Oin. You trust Oin, right?”

“Yes.”

“And you trust me?”

“ _Yes_.”

“And I promised I’d come back to you, so trust me.”

Again Ori nodded, but he didn’t look so convinced.

“Look, is there anything I can do that would make you feel better about this?” Fili asked.

“Write,” Ori replied immediately. “Letters.”

As far as demands went, it was an easy enough one to fill, the prince decided. He would be writing to Thorin almost every day anyway, and what would be a little more paper for the raven who’d agreed to carry the messages?

“As you wish. Anything else?”

“Play for me tonight?”

Fili laughed, and did _not_ think of kissing Ori. Instead, he went to fetch his violin, and played until neither of them could keep their eyes open.

 

It was a three days trip to that portion of the forest they now owned, and most of it they spent under a heavy rain. Fili tried to stay positive, to give a good example to his dwarves, but quite frankly he was just as annoyed at them. He would have given anything to be warm at home with Ori and Kis…

By they time they arrived at the place where they had to meet their elven guide, the whole troop felt they would never again be dry. Thankfully the elf had installed a few tents for them, and there was something hot cooking for them.

It came as a surprise to Fili to see Tauriel of all people waiting for them, although it probably should not have. She had pushed to let the dwarves have this portion of the forest after all, and she knew how to fight spiders, or anything that could live in the forest… Fili was glad it was her with them, but he was also glad he hadn’t known before. He might have told Ori, and the younger dwarf might have been upset.

The rest of the troop took a quick liking to Tauriel. That she had prepared for them as comfortable a welcome as there could be in such a place and with such a weather certainly helped. The food wasn’t great but it was hot, and while everyone ate, Tauriel and Fili started discussing their plan of action.

“Are there even spiders at all in here?” the prince asked. “We’re pretty far from Dol Guldur.”

“And yet I think you should not even say that name here,” the elf replied. “The force that ruled there still roams the world, and it is not wise to call to it. And yes, there are spiders. I have been here a few days already, and I have seen traces. Not right at the edge, but closer to it then I would have liked.”

“How many?”

“Too many.”

Fili rolled his eyes at the unhelpful answers, while next to him Oin sneered at the lack of precision of elves. Tauriel too smiled.

“Even one spider is too many,” she admitted. “I did not count them, but I think there is a nest, up the stream. If you decide to make a settlement here, you will have to clear that nest: the stream will be a precious resource.”

“Thought the forest’s water was poisoned,” Oin grumbled, turning his ear trumpet toward the elf. “I remember what it did to poor Bombur. The lad fell asleep, looked like he wouldn’t wake up, and then forgot anything that had happened in the last few months!”

“That is the black river, it is special,” Tauriel explained. “The main river, the one coming from the grey mountains, is dangerous and to be avoided. It was cursed, long before my birth, or maybe set as a defense against enemies from the North, it is not remembered. But there are other, smaller streams, and these are safe.”

That was good to know. They had brought water with them, barrels on a cart, and Fili had planned to have two people bring more from the Celduin every other day. He liked this much better though, because it meant easier access to water, and no sending people away when they might be more useful in the camp.

“Tomorrow, I want you to show us that stream,” he told Tauriel. “I want everyone in the troop to know where it is, and how to go from camp to there. Which means we need to decide where we will build the camp. Have you seen any place that would be suitable?”

“Two hours north from here there is a place with many hazel trees. It is close enough to some animal tracks to make hunting easier, but not so close that they might have to change their current habits to avoid your presence. From there it’s a twenty minutes walk to the stream, and the way should be easy to remember even for dwarves.”

“Perfect. Then in the morning we will go there, and you will lead people by small groups to the stream while the rest start working on the camp. What dangers will we have to keep in mind?”

“Not many out of the forest,” Tauriel assured him. “Some orcs ran toward the grey mountains after the battle, but I doubt many will come back this far South, at least not so soon. In a few years maybe, if they get strong again… as for the spiders, they will not come out of the woods. In all the years that they have plagued us, they never left the cover of trees. They do not even step into clearings… we think the light hurts them, even that of stars.”

Another good news, Fili decided, although they would still make sure to have defences around the camp, and to organise watches. He would not take any chances. He would not lose anyone, not this time. Even for that first night, even under that rain, Fili gave orders to have someone on watch. The unfortunate few who were chosen grumble a little, but no one really protested. They too still remembered too well the Battle of the Five Armies to be taking any chances.

 

By morning, rain had stopped, and the sky was a bright blue. It was too early in spring for it to be really hot, and everything would take a while to dry, but that mattered little at the moment. Why the bright sun shining, the forest did not look as terrible as Fili remembered it. Maybe because the season was different, or his mood, or just because it was not the same part of it, but Mirkwood almost looked decent. The place Tauriel had suggested for their camp wasn’t bad either, and once the area would be safe and cleansed of spiders, it might be a nice place to come from some fresh air. Dwarves did best underground, but during the years of wandering many people of Erebor had gotten used to the surface, and they missed it at times.

Fili was in the first group to be shown the way to the stream, along with Oin and a few others. As promised, it was not very far from the camp. On the way Tauriel showed them tracks of deers and boars, but also the subtle signs that they were nearing spider territory. Webs in the distance, and some plants that only grew near their hunting places. The group was glad to leave the trees and walk back into sunlight. Mirkwood looked decent, but only if you were not in it.

After that trip to the stream, Fili gave more orders regarding the building of the camp, and especially precautions to be taken in the side that would face the forest. Chances of an attack by spider were low, but he would take no risk. He also sent a few hunters out, but insisted that they were to stay on the very edge of the woods, and near enough to be heard if they shouted. Fresh meat would give them strength to build the camp, but it was not worth losing anyone.

Once this and a few other things were taken care of, Fili sat down and wrote to his uncle. They had arrived safely, he said, and had met with Tauriel. She had found them a very decent place to build a camp, and was already working on teaching them everything she could about the spiders, and Mirkwood. It was easy writing to his uncle, not so different from talking to him in councils.

Writing to Ori proved more difficult. Fili would have given up on it if he hadn’t promised. He couldn’t be clinical about the situation the way he’d been with Thorin, but he wasn’t sure how open he could be either. He’d never written letters that weren’t about business, and he couldn’t exactly ask for advice to anyone. In the end, he spent more time writing to Ori than to Thorin, and it made him angry and ashamed for wasting his time on something that should have been so simple. Especially since the result wasn’t even very good.

 

“Dear Ori,

I have arrived whole and well to Mirkwood, and so far things seem okay. Our elven help is Tauriel, and she is helping a lot indeed (I know you don’t like her much, but I didn’t know it would be her, and I’m actually glad because I remember her fighting the spiders).

We are hoping to have deer for dinner.

I miss you a lot, and Kis even more.

Fili”

 

It was short, far too short, especially compared to what he had written to his uncle, but Fili didn’t know what more to say. Anything about the camp might have been boring, and anything about how much he missed Ori would have been inappropriate. Trying to convince himself that he could do no better, Fili gave both letters to the raven that had come with them, and went to see what work needed to be done.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> drinking game idea: take a shot every time I use letters as a way to help a romantic plot move in a fic orz


	21. Letters

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Ori and Fili write to each other

Their first encounter with spiders happened on the second day of their presence in Mirkwood. There was no fight, Tauriel had just taken them close enough to a nest to see the creatures, but it still had an effect on the troop. Up to that point, the dwarves had been worried more about wandering orcs than anything else. Now they had seen that Tauriel, Fili and Oin had not exaggerated their description of the spiders. If anything, they had downplayed how terrible they looked, one dwarf said.

At first Fili worried that some of them might ask to go home now that they truly understood the nature of what was against them. But they were a stubborn bunch, and once they had recovered from the shock, they were asking Tauriel all sorts of questions about how to kill the beast and what their strengths were. Fili felt very proud of them, to be honest. After his first encounter with the spiders, his only hope had been to never see them again.

It was also on that afternoon that the raven came back, carrying two letter. The first, from Thorin, acknowledged the news he had received, and gave a few advice to his nephew. Fili was instructed to write at least twice a week, and the king wondered if he would like to have a second raven sent to him, in case of emergency. Fili decided to accept, to take no chances.

The second letter was from Ori.

  


 

> “Dear Fili,
> 
> Thank you for writing to me. I was getting really worried I admit, and I was so relieved to hear you were well. I know it’s not so far, and I know you’re a great warrior, as are the dwarves with you, but I still worried. I’ll try to be better now, especially if you are in good hands. Whatever else I feel about Tauriel, I will not deny that she is skilled and clever and certainly the very best person there is to help you with this! I won’t let jealousy make me bitter if I can help it.
> 
> Still, I miss you a lot. It’s so strange to be alone so often! I’ve never been alone like that before. Well, not alone maybe, because Kis is here, and she fills a lot of my time… but lonely maybe. I hadn’t been lonely like that in a while. I know what you’re doing in Mirkwood is important but I hope you will be back soon, I miss you.
> 
> Kis misses you too. She cries a lot more than last time, but that might be because she feels how nervous I’ve been this time. Now that I know you’re safe and in good hands, it should be better.
> 
> In other news, I think your mother wants me to assist to some of her meetings with heads of guilds. She says it is usually part of the king’s consort’s job to know who these people are, and to frequently have tea with them. Quite frankly, I don’t think I’ll be much good at it, and I’d rather leave that to someone who knows how to do it. I wanted to suggest Dori, but I thought your mother might be angry at me if I rejected her offer. Do you think you might have a word with her? I do want to help, I promise, but this is not something I can do, much as I wish I could.
> 
> Your uncle is looking at me right now, and I think he’s getting impatient and wants to send the raven back to you quickly, so I’ll finish here for now. I hope you’ll write again, and I’d like to know about how things are going for you, if you’re allowed to speak of it.
> 
> We miss you a lot
> 
> Ori and Kis”

  


Fili reread the letter twice before he managed to tear his eyes away from it and get back to work. It was both pleasant and painful to know that Ori missed him. The pain he understood, but the pleasure was something he probably should not dwell on. So he folded the letter, put it in a small pocket inside his tunic, and went to chat with Tauriel about the best ways to deal with the spider nest near the stream.

Fire was the better option she claimed, but it had to be carefully controlled the entire time, and they needed to wait for the right weather. Destroying the nest only to also burn down the forest would not be so helpful.

“We’ll have to do it before a rainy day,” Tauriel said.

“That’d be a nice idea if you could predict rain with absolute certainty,” Fili’s second Luda agreed, “but we can’t. Might rain while we’re trying to burn the creatures, and then we’ll be in trouble.”

Tauriel look at the dwarf with a frown, as if her words made no sense. Luda stared back with an equal level of bafflement.

“Can _you_ tell precisely when it is going to rain a full day ahead?” Fili asked the elf. “We cannot. If we’re lucky, we can tell one hour early, and even then there’s a chance for mistakes.”

“How odd,” Tauriel replied with a grin. “But I suppose it’s not as useful when you live underground. I will tell you when the time is right then, it’s that simple.”

“And we’ll take care of the fire,” Luda assured her with a cruel smirk. “I’m _good_ at fire. Gimme some pine resin, naphtha and sulphur, and I’ll burn down _anything_.”

Tauriel tried to smile, clearly unsure if it was a joke or not. It was not. Luda’s talent with incendiary weapons and explosives was part of why she was there. That, and because as long as she was away from any form of fire, she was very friendly and good natured whom Dwalin had personally recommended.

  


When evening came, Fili retired to his tent and read Ori’s letter again. And again. And again. By the time he managed to get started on an answer, it was dark enough that even a dwarf would need a candle.

  


 

> “Dear Ori,
> 
> I miss you terribly too. I wish I were at home with you and Kis instead of here. I would give anything to sleep in your bed tonight, rather that in this tent.
> 
> I’m sorry that you are lonely. Maybe you should invite Dori to come spend some time with you? I’m sure he’d be very happy to chat with you and play with Kis. Or ask Nori! Ze probably needs a break from… whatever it is ze even does. I’m not sure I want to know. It’s probably dangerous and illegal and absolutely needed to make sure Erebor doesn’t fall into chaos. But ze still needs a break, and you need company.
> 
> Concerning mother, I’ll talk to her when I’m back. There are plenty of things you can do, so let’s not force you into situations that make you uncomfortable. Actually, if you want, I can write her and make sure right away that she doesn’t insist. The choice is yours.
> 
> And about here… not much to say. We approached the nearest spider nest for the first time this morning. Everyone was pretty shaken, and honestly so was I. I didn’t remember them being so big. I managed to look cool and unaffected by the sight, but the truth is I nearly wet my pants at the idea of going against these monsters. I remember how easily they overcame us last time. I know we were tired and hungry and made sick by that blasted forest, but it was still too easy for them to capture us. I hope we will do better this time. I hope I will not lead these people to their death. I hope I can be a good commander. I’m not sure I want to be one, but if I have to, then I must try to be a good one, as good as I can be.
> 
> Sorry, that was rather grim. It is getting late as I write, but I want to send this early tomorrow morning. I suppose I’d better go to bed now.
> 
> I miss you so much
> 
> Fili”

  


In the following days, Luda and Tauriel became great friends. A common desire to annihilate giant spiders was a great way to bring people together it seemed. They were often discussing about explosives, and Luda was trying to figure out how to make fiery arrows for the elf. Fili was not sure if he was proud of their work, or terrified by them.

There was apparently a betting pool on whether Luda would proposition the elf.

“Isn’t she _married_?” Fili protested when Oin asked him if he wanted to take part in it. Which was of course the wrong thing to say, because he should have just forbidden that sort of games, but still…

“Never stopped anyone,” Oin replied loudly. “And a few people have said that Luda will offer herself and her wife for the elf’s bed.”

“But isn’t her wife her One?”

“Again, never stopped anyone. Should I put you down as a no then?”

“I’m not betting at all. And if either Tauriel or Luda hear about this and say they don’t like it, the betting stops right away, am I clear?”

Oin grumbled, and started cleaning his hearing trumpet, but Fili insisted until he got a clear yes.

Not that it was all fun and games. Twice, a few dwarves were sent to observe the spiders from a safe distance, with the instruction to retreat quickly if they were spotted. As Fili explained to his troop, they couldn’t rely only on what Tauriel had told them. She was an elf and thought like one, and perhaps dwarves would notice things about the creatures that an elf wouldn’t have seen. The beasts were dangerous, and Fili wanted to be sure they really knew what they were going against. At least he hoped that was what he had in mind, and that he wasn’t just afraid of attacking. It seemed prudent and wise to wait before putting themselves into danger, but maybe he was just being a coward.

He wondered sometimes what Kili would have done in his place.

Flirted with both Tauriel and Luda, probably, and then recklessly thrown himself into danger simply because it was there. Kili had not yet learned that just because he could do something did not mean he _should_. He would never learn it now, because Fili had failed to protect him.

He could not fail again.

It was a relief in a way when Ori and Thorin’s next letters came in. Fili was glad to be distracted from everything he had to do and think about.

  


 

> “Dear Fili,
> 
> When you come home, you’ll have to sleep with me every day until you have to leave again. Maybe by then you’ll be tired of it, and your tent will seem comfortable compared to sleeping with me. I think it is worth a try.
> 
> Regarding your advice about loneliness, I’ve tried to invite Dori, but he had to decline, because he’s managed to convince amad to come live with him until the baby is born, and he doesn’t want to leave her alone. So I went to see them, with Kis, but I don’t think I will again. Amad spent the whole time trying to prove that adad means well, and that he really loves me but doesn’t know how to show it and that he’s trying to care for me and her and… it was not very nice. I came out of there feeling very badly. I’m better now though. Nori heard about it and came to visit. Ze gave me some sweets and told me that adad is not a good person and I should not try to forgive him just to make amad feel better about things.
> 
> I’d be very, very happy if you wrote to your mother. I am a little scared of making her angry or of disappointing her. She’s been so kind to me all this time! And I really like her and I want to please her but I feel very unwell just thinking of having to make small talk with strangers or to have to discuss important things. I’ll do it if she tells you that I have to, but if there’s any chance you can save me from this then please, do it.
> 
> And now, about these spiders. I think that anyone who had to fight them like we did would be afraid. The others have only seen them from the distance, but you’ve had to fight them off twice, while tired and hungry the first time, and then while partly poisoned the other. You are very brave to have agreed to fight against them again, and I so admire you for this. I’m not sure how many in the company would have agreed to do what you are doing. I know Nori wouldn’t have, because ze told me if Thorin tried to send him there, ze’d run to the Orocarni and would never look back. I don’t think ze really would though. And I know it wouldn’t be an option for you, but you could still have refused, and you didn’t, because you are brave like that. I like that you are brave, and I know that you will be a good leader to your soldiers. And I hope no one gets killed or hurt, but if it happens, it won’t mean you’re bad at this. Sometimes, back luck happens. But I know you’ll do your best to get everyone home, because you are kind and like to protect people. Just remember to get yourself home too. I know you’ll protect everyone else, but you have to protect yourself too, because I would be so sad if you died, and so would be Kis, and your mother and uncle and Nori and everyone else. We all love you so remember to not die.
> 
> I miss you a lot
> 
> Please be safe
> 
> Ori”

  


Fili had sat under a tree to read the letter, somewhere he had hoped to be left alone. As he read, he felt his worries slowly leave him, pushed away but the trust in him that Ori seemed to have. Certainly, if Ori found him kind and brave, then he had to be because the younger dwarf never lied. He _omitted_ things, but he rarely _lied_ as such.

And wasn’t it pleasant to think that someone was waiting for him at home? The thought made him smile, and he found himself imagining his return, taking Kis in his arms to hold and kiss her, and then doing the same to Ori and…

For a moment, the time stopped as Fili realised what it was exactly he had just pictured. Because while he had imagined kissing his daughter forehead and cheek, it was Ori’s lips that had been against his own in that little fantasy.

“Oh shit,” he mumbled, one hand pressed against his mouth. “Oh shit, shit, shit.”

He could not be falling for Ori, could he? Not after all that he’d done to the younger dwarf, not after all he’d shouted at Kili for doing exactly that, not when they weren’t bounded? There had to be another explanation to this, it had just been a little fantasy, it hadn’t meant anything.

Had it?

  
  


 


	22. Luda

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Fili is in denial, and a discussion about Ones is had around dinner

Fili was not in love with Ori.

It was simply out of the question, and he refused to entertain the notion. They were friends, and that friendship was still fragile, and had been hard earned. he would never be so foolish as to fall in love and risk ruining everything. Beside, it would have been ridiculous for him to love Ori. It would have been a recipe for disaster, because Fili knew very well the younger dwarf was not his One, and because some of the things he’d done in the past could never be forgiven, and because no decent dwarf would ever fall in love with their own dead brother’s lover, and because Ori would never have loved him back.

Fili was not in love with Ori. Mildly attracted maybe, if even that.

So he put away Ori's letter to answer it at a later date, and tried to forget that moment of doubt.

He did not do a very good job of it, to be fair. Even with all that needed to be done, even with all the planning for an attack against the spiders’ nest, even with the need to assess the resources available in the woods, Fili still found himself thinking of Ori.

To distract himself from thoughts of his husband, Fili tried to work harder, and to spend as little time alone as possible. There was a lot to organise still, and reports to be heard from the dwarves going in the forest to observe the spiders. He also started paying more attention to the conversations during the meals, hoping that the discussions would change his mind.

That plan didn’t work so well, because one of the younger members of the troop, Keris, asked one night to Luda for advice on how to court someone.

“I’ve finally met my One some days before we left,” she explained, “but I did not dare to speak to hir then. I don’t really know how to do that and… well, you’re the only one of us who’s got experience with that, so…”

“The prince’s married too,” Luda protested.

“Oh, but _that_ doesn’t really count,” Keris replied with a dismissive handwave. She froze when she realized what she’s said, and threw a terrified look at Fili. “I meant no offence my prince! I would never dare…! But it’s only that… Well, Luda is actually… I mean, she’s…”

The poor girl looked on the brink of tears, and looked around for support. The others seemed just as embarrassed and worried as her, even Luda who let nothing scare her. Even _Oin_ seemed ill at ease, and that was not good. Fili frowned. Did he have such a bad reputation then, that they would fear his anger so much?

“They think that you only married your husband because of your child, so you’re not fit to give advice on romance,” Tauriel said after a while, breaking the silence.

The way the dwarves either gasped or tensed, she’d guessed right. Clearly, the little lie that Dis had tried to spread about Ori and him being madly in love hadn’t worked so well.

“Well, that’s not so wrong,” Fili admitted with a lopsided smirk. “To be honest, if Luda has tips to give, I’d gladly listen to that because it might help.”

Luda grinned at that, and the others relaxed.

It was not that he really wanted to know how to woo someone, Fili told himself. It was just that pretending his marriage to Ori had been one of love would have insulted their intelligence, but saying he still did not care for his husband would have meant his mother and him had been spreading lies. That was all there was to it.

And it seemed to work, because everyone focused on Keris and Luda again, instead of him.

“My first advice,” Luda said, “is don’t get married too quick, no matter what. Tes and I did it three months after we met, because we thought since we were each other’s One, it would go all nice and easy, but it didn’t. After six months, she went back to live with her parents and we couldn’t stand each other. Took us a lot of work to fix things, and that could have been avoided if we’d just waited until we knew each other better, and knew what to expect. Turns out, not everyone likes it when you use the kitchen to make explosives.”

Luda shook her head as if she still did not understand how that was a bad thing, and it got her a few laughter.

“Ze’s got three older siblings anyway,” Keris said with a shudder. “I don’t think they’d let us get married until ze’s at least two hundred, if even then.”

“Yeah, well you’ll have time to courting properly then. It’s so weird taking on dates someone you’re already married to. Dates are nice, they’re the moment you ask things about their family and hobbies and things like that. It’s important to ask about hobbies. For all you know, your little datefriend makes bombs out of vinegar and baking soda like a someone I won’t name.”

Keris grimaced at the idea, and everyone laughed again. Even Tauriel smiled, clearly fascinated by this glimpse into the life of dwarves.

“No but really, ask about hir hobbies,” Luda insisted, a little more seriously. “You learn a lot about someone when they talk about something they love. Ask about hir favourite story, hir favourite food or colour… and when ze asks you the same, answer honestly. You’ll be tempted to lie to make yourself sound more interesting, but you can’t lie forever. Maybe you hate that story ze loves. Maybe ze can’t stand spicy food and you adore it. Love isn’t about being the same, it’s about having someone who let’s you be yourself and who you enjoy seeing happily be themselves. If you start lying, you’ll be in trouble.”

Keris nodded seriously, looking as if she were trying to think of questions and answers already. Fili decided to take his chance.

“So, you and your wife did not always get along then?” he asked. “You don’t have to talk about it if you don’t want to, but it’s… well, I’ve only ever heard of people for whom everything was perfect all along, so…”

“Then they’re lying,” Luda sniggered. “Tes and I were particularly bad at this, but Maker knows no one has it perfect. It’s just what adults tell kids to encourage them to wait for their One… a whole lot of orc’s shit, if you ask me. We’d probably have been less awful to each other if we’d fooled around with other people before, if you ask me. Then we wouldn’t have needed to stay apart for two years before we could bear to be near each other again… and then it took us a while more to just become friends, and we’ve only been a couple again for three years. Still not living together again, but we’ve decided to give it another try when I’m done with this business here.”

The conversation then shifted to couples who’d had troubles, in spite of being each other’s Ones. Everyone knew at least one such couple, sometimes even more. Keris’s parents had not had an easy time of it she explained, whereas all of Greir’s siblings had had troubles with their Ones; hir eldest brother still wasn’t married to his One, even though he’d known her for nearly a century. Two of Faro’s cousins bore each other’s Mark, and after a few awkward years they had married other people, and the two couples lived together in a single house.

It was as if a weight had been lifted from Fili’s shoulders. It was not just because of him then. For years, he’d thought that everything that had gone wrong with Kili was because of him, of them, because they were failing somehow, because Fili was not good enough… But other people too had problems with their One.

Other people had problems, and these problems could be overcome.

Maybe if Kili had lived, they would have eventually gone back to the way they were before the Marks. Maybe they would have figured out how to be happy again. And just that, this thought of a future that could never be, was a comfort. A bittersweet one, but a comfort nonetheless.

 

> “Dear Ori,
> 
> I am sorry that it took me a few days to answer, there has been a lot to do, and a lot to think about.
> 
> I’m sorry that your mother so insists on defending your father. I imagine it would be difficult for her to accept what a horrible person he is, after so many years by his side. But he is still awful, and he hurt you. You have every right to distance yourself from someone who treated you so badly, and also from anyone who tries to tell you that he meant well. His intentions matter little, it’s the result that count.
> 
> I’m sending a letter to mother along with this one, and I’ll talk to her as soon as I’m home. Don’t worry about anything. I want you to be happy and comfortable, or else we won’t be any better than your father.
> 
> Thank you for your comforting words. I feel a lot better about my fears now, and it turns, it makes me less scared. Thank you for your support, it means the world to me.
> 
> Now, for something a little happier: do you think you could prepare a selection of books for me when I’m home again? I do get a moment of freedom or two here, sometimes, and when it happens, I get pretty bored. So if you have ideas of things I could read… I don’t have any preferences, just pick anything you like best, and I’ll try that. I’m told you’ve read every single book that existed in Ered Luin, so I’m sure you can find something nice.
> 
> I miss you terribly, and Kis too. I cannot wait to be home again with you.
> 
> Fili
> 
> PS: I might be tempted to take you to your word on this offer to sleep in your bed every night when I come back. Don’t offer it unless you mean it, because I like the idea a little too much."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hello, sorry that this chapter was so long in coming! I've moved last week (at last ;3; ) and since then I've been... less than inspired, I'll admit. Part of it is just that after all my recent stress, I needed a little time to relax... and also I dont have internet at home, so it limits me in terms of writing.  
> hence, also, the sorta short chapter


	23. Home

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The spiders are taken care of.

A snow howl' cry rang through the forest, loud and clear. Fili turned in direction of the nest, and whistled like a nightingale to let Tauriel's group know that all the baits were in place. It did not take long before a large band of monstrous spiders ran into the clearing and toward the two piles of meat that had been laid out for them. There were more than Fili had expected, but that just meant the creatures started fighting for the meat. They did not seem to notice that it had been sprinkled with some herbs that, according to Tauriel, made spiders slower and no smarter than their smaller cousins.

Silently, Fili raised his hand. He heard bows being prepared being him, and the sharp smell of Luda's product for fire arrows.

Fili lowered his hand.

Luda had promised him a rain of fire, and it was exactly the effect they got. It clung to the spiders, spreading from one to the other at the slightest brush, made easier by the fact that they'd been fighting just seconds before. It was just like that night on the cliff, with Azog's wargs and Gandalf's fire and...

“Luda's team is shooting them too now,” Keris said. “Should we shoot again?”

“Yes, before they can escape back to the nest,” Fili ordered. “Let's not give Tauriel and the others more trouble than they already have. And remember, we don't want a single survivor!”

Tauriel had said she’d never seen anything to prove that different nests would care about avenging a fallen one, but Fili did not want to take any risks. Thankfully, the spiders were disoriented by the poisoned meat they had eaten, and terrified because of the fire, so they were no match at all. Those that did not fell to arrows were taken care of by some bombs of Luda's design. In less than an hour it was done, and they slowly returned to the camp, keeping an eye open in case one creature had survived their attack, or the one at the nest.

Gerin and Lors were immensely relieved when they saw the fighters coming back. They'd been left behind, so that there'd be someone to warn Erebor should things go wrong, but since all was fine they set out to make lunch instead. Just as the stew was getting done it started raining, like Tauriel had predicted. Then soon after that the elf's group came out of the forest, not a single one of them missing nor hurt, and Fili could breathe again. He had done well enough as a leader so far, in spite of all his fears.

“We've had them all I think,” Tauriel announced while everyone tried to hide from the rain. “I think we'll have to keep an eye on the nest for some days just in case, but I think we are safe enough. Not even an egg escaped us. You can go tell your uncle that all is going well.”

“I will then. I'll leave Luda in charge of things, and I hope you'll advise her as you would for me. I think Keris should come with me though. A prince can't travel without some escort.”

Propriety was less important than the fact that it would be cruel to keep Keris from the One she'd met so recently, but Fili did not think it was something a prince should say. Neither did he say that he hoped he'd find someone else to replace Keris, if she wanted to stay in Erebor to court her One. He wasn't soon she would anyway. He'd heard a few of his soldiers say that a mission like theirs was quite glorious all in all, and that glory made it far easier to pick up people in taverns. Maybe Keris would be of that opinion about the aura it gave her. Fili himself knew that if he'd been given the choice, he wouldn't leave Erebor ever again.

 

Much as he wanted to see Ori and Kis again, Fili's first stop in Erebor was to his uncle's office to report on the situation. Thorin agreed that the destruction of this first nest was a good sign, and hoped that the next ones would be so easy. At the suggestion of Tauriel, Fili also mentioned the possibility of later on sending dwarves to Thranduil's kingdom to help the elves get rid of their own nests; dwarves could not risk using incendiary weapons alone in the forest, whereas the elves' current method of dealing with the spiders was less effective than just burning them down, and cooperation could be profitable to everyone.

“If I were to put fire to something in their kingdom, it's not the spiders I'd pick,” Thorin muttered. “But they might not like it if I turned their king into a torch.”

“I think Tauriel at least might hand you the matches,” Fili smirked. “The sindarin nobility likes him well enough, but the sylvan people are a little fed up with being treated as second class subjects, she says. She's sure he'd have given more weight to her reports about the progression of spiders if she'd been the _right_ sort of elf.”

“Always the problem when king and subject are not of the same people. I'm told your great-grandmother had the same problem sometimes, and even after she married Thror, people wouldn't take her seriously. She was more competent than most of these nobles who looked down on her because she was a foreigner though...”

Thorin paused a moment, eyes unfocused. Fili wished he'd known his great-grandmother, or any of his family. He thought he remembered Thrain, but it might just have been memories of a much younger Balin, he wasn't sure.

“I think I like your Tauriel,” Thorin decided, coming back to the present. “Let's see how things progress around the camp, and if all goes well, I'll have a talk with her about having a talk with Thranduil.”

“Understood. Do you need me for anything else, uncle? If not, I haven't seen Ori and Kis in a few weeks and I miss them terribly, so...”

His uncle nodded, and rose from his chair.

“They are with Dis I think. I think she invited them, along with Ori's family. Well, the part of his family that is still allowed inside the palace. And since I need to talk to Nori... let's go together.”

Fili agreed, smiling to hide his disappointment. After so long away from Ori, he would have hoped they'd meet again somewhere private. It wasn't that he intended to do or say _anything_ that couldn't be said in front of both their family, because Ori was nothing but a close _friend_ , but a little privacy would still have been nice.

On their way to Dis's apartments, Fili and Thorin talked of news from within and without the mountains. There were still problems with some of the mines that had been damaged by Smaug's presence, and a few might never be used again. There were also rumours that the Blackfists might send an emissary to reopen the old trade routes, but Thorin would believe that only when someone did come to him carrying a letter with the seal of the Low Queen. He was starting to ponder the possibility of sending their own emissary first, but by then they had arrived in front of Dis's door.

“His highness king Thorin, and prince Fili,” Dis's handmaid announced as she let them in.

Everyone that was family was inside. Ari was sitting between Dis and Dori, her pregnancy not yet showing, although it would start soon. Nori was sprawled in a chair. Ori was, as usual, on the ground with Kis, playing with her. They all looked up toward the new guests, and before Dis had so much as risen from her couch, Ori had already dashed to Fili to hug him. Fili did not hesitate a second before hugging back. It was good, in the end, that there were others with them, or else he might have kissed Ori, and that would have been terrible.

“I missed you,” Ori said when he pulled away, and then kissed Fili's cheek.

It was not a lover's kiss, and could not have meant anything different than when Ori kissed their daughter. Still Fili felt as if his heart were blowing in his chest, growing so big that it became difficult to breathe.

“I missed you too,” Fili mumbled, before turning toward Kis. “And I've missed my little princess too. Come here say hello to adad, Kis!”

The baby giggled happily at hearing her name called, and strutted toward Fili. She was walking with far more assurance than he remembered. She laughed when he picked her up, but refused to let herself be kissed, pushing his face away any time he tried.

“Ori was like that all the time as a baby,” Ari said, and her children nodded. “Worse, really, we could barely touch him without him crying.”

“Well, this one is a cuddler if not a kisser,” Fili replied. “She'd always be in Ori's arm if she could, wouldn't she?”

Ori nodded, smiling widely, before pushing Fili toward one of the free chairs, next to Thorin. Tea was served, and more biscuits was brought, most of which Fili gave to Kis to chew on.

Fili was home at last.


	24. late night conversation

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Fili finds something, and talks about it with Ori  
> Much embarrassment ensues

Fili was sprawled on the bed, half tangled in the sheets, huddled close to Ori, and there was nowhere he'd rather have been. It should have been odd, going to bed with his husband, with the way he'd started thinking about Ori, but instead it was the most perfect thing ever. Fili only realised how much he'd missed it when he had it again. And Ori, true to his word, had let him sleep with him the entire week that he'd been back.

It was comfortable and happy, and Fili let out a small, disapproving noise when he felt Ori try to sit up.

“I hear Kis,” he just said.

Which was a perfectly reasonable reason to leave the bed, and even though Fili couldn't hear anything, he reluctantly let go of Ori. They'd barely gotten into bed, and Fili was exhausted, but he made sure to stay awake. It was selfish, and maybe dishonest, but he liked falling asleep with Ori in his arms and he did not intend to lose a chance to do so.

“She's lost her stuffed lion,” Ori called from Kis's room. “The one Bifur made. Can you look for it?”

It took all of Fili's energy to sit up and look around, but for his daughter's sake, he managed. A quick look around the room gave him nothing, so Fili had no choice but to leave the bed and actually search. He tried to get up, but instead fell down to the ground, having forgotten the sheets around his legs. Just as well, he decided. Memories of his own childhood reminded him that toys liked to hide under beds, so he looked there.

Indeed, there was a strange shape there, somewhere he could reach but that Kis certainly wouldn't have. He felt for it, and his fingers met wood. It wasn't the lion then, but Fili was too sleepy to force his curiosity away: he grabbed the wooden thing, and pulled it to himself. It turned out to be a wooden box, closed by a ribbon that might have been purple or blue. The ribbon was quickly undone, the box opened, and inside was...

Fili had no idea what _that_ was. Some sort of long and smooth cylinder of smooth, polished stone with a round tip, and with it a small bottle of something that, upon inspection, turned out to be a sort of thick oil. The cylinder did not have a single sharp line to it, and it seemed that the oil had been used on it. Maybe to polish it, Fili thought. Or maybe it was some sort of tool that Ori used for his drawings. But then, why hide it under the bed rather than to put it with his pencils and brushes?

“She's sleeping,” Ori announced, coming back into the room. “The lion was behind... oh!”

The younger dwarf froze as he saw what Fili was holding, his face quickly turning an intense shade of red. Fili too blushed, although he wasn't sure why.

“I was looking for the lion,” he quickly explained, putting back everything into the box, “and then I found this and I know I shouldn't have look but I just...”

Without a word Ori snatched the box from Fili's hands, tied the ribbon with shaky hands,and then threw everything back under the bed.

“I'm really sorry, I shouldn't have,” Fili mumbled, almost certain he'd have to finish the night in his own bed. “I just didn't know what it was and I got curious and... well I still don't know what it is even after seeing it, but I swear I'm sorry and I'll never do that again.”

“You don't know what it is?”

Daring a glance toward his husband, Fili saw that Ori was more astonished than angry.

“I've never seen anything like that in my life,” the prince confessed. “If they're supposed to be widely spread, then the fashion never reached me.”

“It's a...” Ori started, but he got so embarrassed he could not say more. He would not even look at Fili, and his blush was now so strong that his freckles disappeared under it.

/It's a toy for pleasure/ he signed, still not looking at Fili. /You use it to do as if you had a lover. To put inside./

In his sleepy state, it took a few seconds for Fili to figure inside of what the toy was supposed to go. A few seconds, and then his mind suggested some very graphic images of what Ori might look like using it.

“But why would you have one?” Fili stuttered. “I mean, you're... you... well, why would you have one?”

“Sex is nice,” Ori mumbled. “I miss it. Got used to it with Kili. Then... for a while I didn't want after... everything. Now... Now I want again. So Nori got me this.”

“You got used to it from _one time_?” Fili gasped.

Ori looked his way for a second, and laughed.

He laughed and laughed, so hard that he had to sit on the bed, so hard that Fili would have feared he might choke, if he hadn't feel so embarrassed about the whole thing. It was a fair question to ask, wasn't it? And that night, so long ago, when Ori had told him about being with child, he'd said that it had been just once, that...

It occurred to Fili, then, that the other dwarf might have lied that night, desperate as he'd been to get help.

“It was not the first time you'd had... done _that_ with Kili, was it? When Kis was... conceived?”

“A little of a first time?” Ori admitted with a shy smile. “The first time that could have gotten me with child. But we'd done... other things. _All_ the other things, just not that. We didn't want a baby. Not in Ered Luin. My family... and then you... we _couldn't_ have a baby there.”

“But you could here?”

Ori shrugged sadly.

“Thought I'd die in the battle. It didn't matter. I just wanted... Kili. All of him.”

The younger dwarf looked so sad then that Fili climbed back onto the bed to hug him.

It had not been a lie then, just not all of the truth, which was the closest Ori could manage with a straight face. Fili still felt upset though, because that was another thing that Kili had kept from him. Ori hadn't said everything, but Kili had lied, more than once, whenever he'd promised Fili that he'd never touched Ori, never done more than hold his hand or steal a kiss here and there. And Fili had believed it, because it fit with what he could see, with the way Ori wouldn't let anyone touch him, not even Kili most of the time.

“I always imagined you wouldn't have liked sex,” Fili confessed. “With the way you are when anyone touches you...”

“Only the wrong people, or the wrong moment. _You're_ touching me now,” Ori pointed out, and the prince nodded. “You don't like sex,” Ori then added.

It was more of an affirmation than a question, but Fili took a moment to ponder it. Back in Ered Luin, he would have agreed, because sex could only happen with your One, and he certainly didn't want Kili, nor did his brother want him, and he'd never considered the possibility of it happening with anyone else. But that had been in Ered Luin. He was in Erebor now, and he didn't know what he felt for Ori, but there might have been some lust in there. He'd never so wanted to kiss someone before, nor to touch and hold them, and his earlier thought about Ori using that toy was still nagging at the corner of his brain, waiting for a moment of quiet to be fully explored.

“I don't know what I like,” Fili sighed. “I've never thought about it that much. I wasn't supposed to. It would have been horrible of me to want Kili!”

“Other people ?”

“I was not allowed. Only my One... but I don't know anymore. I think... I'm starting to think that everything I thought I knew about love and sex and Ones and all these things was just wrong, and I don't know what to think anymore.”

Ori huddled close to him. “Sometimes, you just don't know. It's okay. Gives you time to think. So think. And then, when you decide...” he hesitated there, and held Fili tighter for a second before pulling out to look right into his husband's eyes, a very serious air about him. “If you want to try, maybe I can help. If you want. Or can help you find someone to help. Nori knows people, they would be nice to you. It's important to be nice the first time.”

Fili did not want to know if Kili had been nice to him when they'd first come together, but the smile on Ori's face told him anyway. It was the fond, nostalgic grin he had whenever he recalled his better moments with Kili, and for the first time, Fili admitted to himself that he was jealous of his brother's memory.

It should have acted as a warning, that jealousy. It should have made him realise that whatever he felt for Ori now, he was in serious dangerous of feeling more than he should have. It should have made him go back to his own room, and sleep there on his own until he'd gotten rid of this unwanted emotions.

“I'll keep that in mind,” Fili said instead. “If I ever decide to try sex, I promise you'll be the first person I'll think of.”

Ori answered with a smile, the one he had when he wasn't sure if people were joking or not. Fili dared not insist that he was sincere, and instead, they just went back to bed. There was a moment of awkwardness as they settled again under the covers. After such a conversation, and after his news realisations, Fili wasn't sure if he was allowed to touch and hold Ori anymore. Ori settled that for him by snuggling next to his husband, closer than before it seemed, until Fili had no choice but to put an arm around his waist.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yep, so, Fili as I see him is somewhere on the asexual spectrum. Probably demisexual. At this point, even I'm not sure if Ori and him will ever try to have sex, but even if they do, it's almost certain to not happen within the span of this fic.  
> Unless my plans change again


	25. Ori's bracelet

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Fili enjoys being home once more, until his uncle and him have a conversation

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warning: mention of past self harm and suicidal thoughts

Fili was supposed to stay only one week in Erebor before he went back to Mirkwood, but Thorin soon decided that they'd need at least three to decide on what they should do next. Since Luda seemed to be doing well at the camp according both to her letters and to the ravens carrying them, Fili saw no problem with that. They had gone to the nest a couple times already, but found no traces of surviving spiders, meaning that portion of the forest seemed secure for the time being.

Because of this, Fili was asked to meet several guild masters. He had to tell them about the forest, to convince them it was safe now, and to talk about the resources he had noticed there that they might use. Wood of course, but some plants too, and a variety of animals that could be valuable for their meet or skin. Fili had made a list while he'd been in Mirkwood, but it satisfied no one, and most guilds decided that once they were fully sure it was safe, they would send someone to make a proper evaluation of what could be found in the forest. The (tanneur) guild and the young, small printers guild were the only ones to ask to send someone right away.

Whenever he wasn't visiting guilds, Fili was usually at home. It was a bit of a disruption on Ori's routine to have him there, but the young dwarf got used to it once he understood it meant someone else could be playing with Kis, giving him a little time to work on his writings and drawings.

“Why don't you leave her more with her nurse if you miss doing your things so much?”

“I give her to Sain when I have to help your mother. For _important_ things. It'd be selfish to just...”

“Kis likes Sain,” Fili protested, “And you need to have time for yourself. It's not selfishness, everyone needs some time off. I mean it, you look tired. Look, if you won't give her to Sain for one afternoon, then I'll take her, how about that?”

Ori frowned uncertainly, and Fili smiled.

“It'd be a great idea,” he insisted. “I've missed her a lot when I was gone, I want to have some time with her before I go again... and that way, you get to have some free time without guilt. It would make all of us happy after all.”

Even though he was not entirely convinced, Ori eventually agreed, and with little resistance. He must have craved some free time then. Fili would have to slip a word about it to Sain, and to his mother, to made sure that Ori got some time off. Just because he was married to Fili did not have to mean that he had to be as busy as him.

  
  


It was a nice afternoon that Fili spent with his daughter. Since Ori had mentioned that he might write about their travel to Erebor, and that it was an activity for which he needed silence, Fili had taken Kis away. After some hesitation, he eventually decided that Thorin too needed to relax a little, and that the best way to do that would be for him to play with his great-niece.

Luckily, the king had nothing urgent to attend, and he gladly went along with that plan. Fili wasn't sure if kings were supposed to let anyone step and jump on their stomach that way, but Thorin seemed pretty happy to let Kis do it. He only protested when his great-niece started tickling him, helped by her father, but even then he wasn't protesting too hard. After a while, Kis got grumpy, which prompted Fili to feed her, and she fell asleep not long after.

“We'll go home after her nap,” Fili promised as he knelt to put her comfortably on a chair. “Sorry to have disrupted your schedule.”

“I don't think you are sorry at all,” Thorin replied with a grin. “I certainly am not. She is a lovely child... very much like Kili at her age. He liked to jump on me too. Not you though. You were always very serious.”

Fili kissed his daughter's brow and stood up to look at her. Ori insisted that she looked like Kili, but Fili never really saw it, not with her hair as golden as his own. It was a comfort however to know that others could see her sire in her.

“Can I offer you some tea?” Thorin asked. “Or coffee maybe, if the Ris haven't entirely converted you to water and leaves. Biscuits too, in both cases, although if you choose to have tea, I might not break into the nicer ones.”

“I'll have coffee then. I remember you have excellent taste in biscuits... even if I have indeed developed a fondness for tea lately.”

“Not just for tea, I'm told,” Thorin remarked, before ringing for a servant and asking for some coffee.

The king went to sit then, and gesture at his nephew to join him.

“Fili, I want you to know that I trust you,” Thorin said as the prince sat down. “Much as things have not always been perfect between you and your husband, I know that at the present day, you would not hurt him. I would even go as far as to say that the two of you seem to be friends now, for which I am immensely glad. But I have heard...”

The arrival of a servant carrying coffee and biscuits forced him to stop for a moment, but Thorin resumed as soon as they were alone again.

“I did not listen to idle gossip before,” he explained, “And if I had noticed things on my own, I would not care what people say. But we have all noticed the way you look at Ori sometimes, the way he looks at you... and that alone wouldn't be much of course, but then he kissed you when you came back from Mirkwood...”

“Only on the cheek!” Fili exclaimed, mortified. “Uncle, I don't know what...”

“He kisses you on the cheek in public, and I'm told you share his bed frequently,” Thorin cut him. “Every night since your return actually. Now, I don't think Ori would let you do anything to him that he does not enjoy, but he is young, you both are... and either of you might end up with child if you are not careful. Ori suffered a great deal when he was carrying Kis, and I know when your mother was carrying you...”

“We're not doing anything like that!” Fili squeaked, his cheeks burning.

“I'm glad you're being careful. You can see about another child later, when you reach your hundreds, but right now it would be better if you kept your... entertainments to safe things.”

Fili put his head in his hands and shivered. This was even worse than the very short talk he'd gotten decades ago about the way babies were made. He didn't know what he felt for Ori, what he wanted with him, but apparently, everyone else had decided that they knew better than him.

“Uncle, we're not lovers,” he hissed.

Not yet, he didn't add. There was so much he wasn't sure of, and he didn't want to allow himself to think about what it might be like to have sex with Ori. He would do that later, in Mirkwood. He wouldn't be sharing anyone's bed there, and that meant no one would have to know if his body reacted in any way to the concept of Ori naked and willing against him.

Thorin seemed sincerely surprised by that affirmation, and somewhat disappointed.

“You do not have to lie to me, Fili. I do not judge you. He is a handsome boy, very clever and very kind, and you could have fallen in love with far worse than him. If you told me that your marriage was no longer one of mere convenience, I would be happy for you.”

“Well, don't be happy then,” Fili snapped, “because I don't...”

The prince didn't finish. I don't love him, he'd meant to say, but the words did not feel right.

He didn't know if there was any truth about what Thorin had said, about Fili looking differently at his husband, but the way he thought about Ori was unlike his thoughts for anyone else. The mere idea of Ori had made him smile, even when he'd been in Mirkwood and little else could bring him joy. He liked when they could chat, or when they were silent together, or even sometimes when they had an argument, if it was about something innocent enough, like the value of a book or of a piece of music. He liked the way Ori looked, the way he smiled, the way he frowned, the way he didn't say many things aloud but had a thousand little gestures that talked for him. He liked that Ori understood how complicated things had been with Kili, and didn't seem to judge him for it. Fili liked Ori for everything that he did and was, and he wasn't sure if that was love, but it certainly sounded a bit like it.

“Is there a problem, Fili?” his uncle asked, worry written on his face. “I am sorry, I did not mean to press you for information but... I love you dearly, and after all I had seen and heard, I wanted to be sure you would not do anything that might put you at risk. You or Ori, although I think he'd have the sense to be careful about himself. But if you say you are not lovers, then I shall believe you.”

“Thank you, uncle,” Fili replied.

They fell silent after that. Thorin had never been an expert of small talk, and Fili was too distracted by his epiphany to care about conversation. He did not move nor make a sound until he heard Kis waking up, and it was time to go home.

  
  


Ori looked far more relaxed when his husband and daughter returned. Fili envied him, because he certainly did not feel calm at all. How could he, when he now knew that he loved Ori? It was, if not the worst news of his life (that would have been Kili's death) nor maybe the second worst (waking up with his brother's name on his wrist was), then it was at least the third worst thing that had ever happened to him.

He only snapped out of his daze when Ori started asking after his day, and talking about his own. Then for a moment he forgot this new problem, delighted by the way Ori was radiating happiness when he explained what progress he'd made on his book, and how it would very soon be finished.

“You'll have to let me read it,” Fili asked. “It's the first time I'll be part of a book, I'll want to read it.”

“When it's edited,” Ori promised. “It's just the first draft. It's awful.”

“I'm sure it's not so bad. I'd love to read it even now... but if you'd be more comfortable making me wait for something more polished, then I'll wait. It'll be worth it.”

That made Ori blush of course, and he was pretty when he blushed... which he did every time Fili complimented him. He would have to compliment his husband more then, praise him until he never stopped blushing.

It wasn't until they'd gone to bed that Fili started again to think of his feelings as a problem.

Fili wasn't sure yet how, nor even _when_ he should tell Ori, but that he would have to say it at some point seemed obvious to him. It would have been dishonest to exchange with his husband gestures of affection and trust when they did not mean the same thing for the two of them, and he'd hurt Ori too much already. Still, it would require courage, and a certain amount of preparation, so Fili decided it might be better to postpone that a little. If he could just ask Luda a few questions... she clearly had some experience with rocky relationships, her advice would be invaluable.

In spite of his decision to push the problem to later, Fili found he could not sleep.

He did not really expect Ori to return his feelings, not after the way he'd treated him in the past. If he made his declaration upon his return from the next trip to Mirkwood, then these present nights were certainly the last ones he'd be spending with his husband. Maybe Ori would even ask to be given new apartments, away from him... Fili intended to give him that option, at least.

But he was going to be so _lonely_ , he realised, watching Ori sleep peacefully when he couldn't.

Ans as he watched, Fili noticed, then, that Ori's old leather band was falling out of place. Usually the younger dwarf kept it tied tight, so much so that Fili suspected it sometimes cut the circulation in his hand. Not so that time. Ori's wrist was visible under it, and on it, faint, pale marks. The bracelet was to hide scars, Ori had said once, and Fili knew he'd never worn that bracelet during their travel to Erebor, and it was an unlikely place to be wounded in battle...

He couldn't blame Ori if he'd taken a blade to himself though. Not when he too had been in such pain without Kili, enough so that he'd sometimes considered... but there had been his uncle to help, Erebor to get through that first winter. Ori hadn't had any of that, just the perspective of being once more in his father's power, when he had been promised so much more...

Fili looked as these scars, and wished he'd known months ago the things he did now, so that he might have offered friendship to Ori when they had both needed it most.

He looked, and noticed something that didn't fully look like a scar. Something dark, a sharp form in faded black. Cold dread took over Fili. He had no right to investigate, Ori had made it more than clear that he didn't like when people brought the bracelet to attention, let alone wanted to know what was underneath, and he would be furious if Fili looked...

But that dark shape was far too familiar for Fili to just ignore it.

It might just be a coincidence, he told himself, his fingers brushing against the leather. It might have been ink that had fallen there, or a tattoo to cover the scars, as some warriors did. It might be anything. It had to be anything. It couldn't be...

He pushed the bracelet up a little, and gasped in horror.

There, sharp but with a faded colour, were four letters. Just four letters, and everything was changed.

It was the second time Fili regretted discovering his brother's name on someone's skin.

He regretted it even more when his eyes met Ori's own, cold and angry.

“What are you _doing_?”

 


	26. the mark

“What are you _doing_?” Ori asked, sitting up.

Fili had not often seen his husband this angry. Not since Ori had stopped fearing Kis might be stolen from him. Quickly, he removed his hand from Ori’s wrist and wriggled away from him, just enough to give him space. Touching him when he was angry would only make him more attacked, at that was not what they needed at the moment.

Ori would never explain that mark if he was too angry to speak.

“Why didn’t you tell me?” Fili asked, trying to sound calm. “All that time and… When did it appear? Did Kili know?”

It was something that happened in stories sometimes, a couple's respective marks that appeared late and were only noticed after someone had died. It didn’t sound likely, and Fili had never believed them, but Ori had never worn that bracelet _before_.

Instead of answering right away, Ori removed the leather band, before putting it back on and tying it again with a practiced gesture, quickly but tightly. He glared at it then, as if that bracelet had personally hurt him.

“Kili knew,” he grunted. “Got them Mirkwood. That’s when. But you had _no right_!”

“Well, you had no right to keep something like that from me!” Fili snapped, only to see Ori flinch. He took a deep breath, and tried to calm down. “Everything would have been different if you’d told me! If you’d told me… I would have been forced to accept that you were Kili’s lover, and… Ori, if you’d told me, you wouldn't have had to _marry_ me!”

Ori looked up from his bracelet at last, and stared at Fili with wide, shocked eyes.

A mark was _not_ a wedding, but in a case like that, it was usually enough to proclaim that a certain dwarf was a child’s sire. It had been done in the past, in cases of that sort, or when a sire had not wanted to recognise their child for some reason. If Ori had gone to Thorin that night and told him that Kili had been his One, that Kis was his daughter…

“It’s an old law,” Fili explained. “You… I thought _everyone_ had heard of that. Ori, there are a dozen love stories out there that use it! How could you not know?”

“Just a story,” Ori replied, looking away again and curling up on himself. “Just _stories_ ,” he repeated, almost a whine. “My aunt, she’d said to adad and… I didn’t want… not like her…”

Ori curled up tighter, rocking on himself. Fili tried to put a hand on his shoulder, seeking to comfort him, but he was pushed away roughly.

/Kili didn’t want you to know/ Ori signed with shaky hands. /He was scared. He thought you would be furious. He asked me not to tell. I didn’t tell. I didn’t want to be his One anyway./

It was Fili’s turn to stare blankly.

“How could you _not_ want to be his One?” he gasped. “I thought you loved him!”

/Amad loves Adad. You loved Kili. I didn’t want to be like that./

“But…”

“We argued after the mark,” Ori sighed, curling up again. “I wanted to tell. He didn’t. We argued _so much_ , I wanted to stop everything.”

Fili nodded silently. He hadn’t paid it much attention at the time, but there had been a few days when Kili and Ori hadn’t talked. Kili had been miserable. Fili vaguely remembered that he’d been so upset seeing his brother like that, he’d gone to argue with Ori. It had never seemed important though, not until that moment.

“Was different after,” Ori resumed weakly. “Before, we were happy. After… Kili was scared of you. Of what you’d say. He didn’t say, but I know he’d decided.”

“Decided what?”

“That he’d pick you, if you forced him.”

“I _wouldn’t_ have forced him to choose,” Fili promised.  
It was such a useless thing to say though. He knew well enough the feeling of being second best. It was not from Fili that Ori would have wanted reassurances, but from Kili who could never give them now. Beside, who could have said what the dwarf he’d been two years before would have done. He thought he’d started getting used to the idea toward the end, maybe, but he might have lashed out anyway when discovering this ultimate betrayal.

“I want to be alone,” Ori asked. “Please. I didn’t want you to know. Not anymore. Everything was so _nice_. I was getting happy again. And now.  Now it’s _over_. I want to be _alone_. Please.”

Leaving Ori alone was the last thing Fili wanted to do, and the only thing he could do.

He got to the door, and stopped there. Everything was over, he realised. Ori’s mark changed everything. Which meant that he had nothing to lose anymore. And if he’d been angry at Ori and Kili for hiding so much from him, then it was only right that he should be honest. The timing was wrong, so wrong, but for all he knew, Ori might never agree to talk to him ever again. This might be his only chance.

“I love you,” he said, turning once more toward the bed.

“I don’t want to love you,” Ori replied, curled up under the cover and facing away from Fili.

The prince didn’t insist, and left.

As Ori had said, it was over now.

 

Ori did not have breakfast with Fili that morning, nor any of the following. The first day he said he felt unwell, and after that he asked the servants to bring him food directly in his room. Fili did not protest. He thought of suggesting that Ori might be given his own apartments if he wanted (there were plenty of empty ones in the palace after all) but his husband never opened his bedroom’s door to him, and a letter might have been seen by the wrong people. If servants could gossip enough for Thorin to hear that they had been sharing a bed, then a letter might have the kingdom talking for the rest of the year. He could not take that risk, for Ori and Kis’s sakes.

When he wasn’t home, Fili found it easy to fake things. He did what he had to do, supervised the supplies that he would take with him to Mirkwood. He inspected things, negotiated with servants and reported to Thorin as if nothing had changed. Sometimes people asked after Ori, and Fili replied very politely that everything was just fine. He even smiled as he said it. Lying was easy. No one seemed to suspect anything, for better or for worse.

 

They still hadn’t exchanged a single word by the time Fili had to leave again, a week after what he now thought of as that _other_ night. Ori did not even come to say goodbye, although he did send Sain and Kis. That, at last, seemed to help everyone realise that something had happened, though they were kind enough not to comment on it. Even Nori seemed surprised, which meant Ori hadn’t told hir.

Fili tried to take that as a good sign.

If Ori had talked to his sibling, it would have meant he felt threatened by him. So if he hadn’t said anything, then maybe…

Or maybe it just meant that Ori really did not want anyone to know about Kili and him, Fili decided as he mounted his pony. Or he might have wanted to wait until Fili was gone to take any measures. It wasn’t as if the prince had proved to be particularly trustworthy so far, had he? Couldn’t blame Ori for being careful.

 

Followed by carts of materials and food for the camp, Fili rode away from the mountain. It was time to focus again on the forest, and his mission there.

Maybe there, at least, he would manage to not make a mess of everything.


	27. return to camp

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Fili learns more about Ori's family, and about spiders

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> warning for: ableism, murder, mentions of a forced abortion, spiders, family abuse, and this just generally being a not happy at all chapter.

“Only one letter today?” Oin noted, looking with interest at the ravens eating next to Fili.

The prince did not look up from his uncle’s newest orders. Thorin wanted him to make a map of their part of the forest, even rudimentary, to show what they would have to work with, and how far from the border were the rest of the spiders’ nest. Tauriel was already working on that, but Fili would have to see if anyone in the camp even knew how to draw maps. He’d had some basic training with Balin when he’d been younger, but having it done by someone truly competent would help in the long term.

“My uncle only ever sends one,” Fili said. “If you want to write to family, then write to Thorin first, and help me convince him that we’re going to need a post system very fast.”

Even if almost everyone in the troop was unmarried, they still had families and friends, and keeping in contact was good for the moral. Beside by the time workers started coming, they would appreciate finding a functioning system. Fili had tried to suggest so a few times already, in vain, but if more people asked for it, it might get done.

“I meant that last time, you’d get letters from Ori too,” Oin explained. “Haven’t seen any so far. Troubles between you kids?”

“I can hardly imagine how that’s any concern of yours,” Fili grumbled, high enough to be heard. “How about we talk about how your work is going? Found many interesting plants around here? Anything that might be profitable to Erebor?”

“Not since yesterday, and you can’t keep asking that every time I ask about something you don’t like.”

Fili grimaced. The previous day, Oin had tried to insist to see a scratch he’d gotten on his hand while training. It hadn’t hurt, and Fili hadn’t wanted to be bothered for nothing.

“Beside, it’s my concern because I _like_ you, and I like that boy,” Oin continued. “You’re both good kids, and _he_ was almost family, you know.”

“No, I didn’t know,” Fili admitted. “He never said.”

Oin frowned, and then grimaced.

“Well, wouldn’t be a good memory for him. But I have a distant cousin who was going to marry Ori’s aunt. They met because her mom had sent her to me to teach about healing. Good kid she was, and then she met Nara. Good kid too, her head always in the clouds, like Ori, but a nice girl. Grein fell in love right away, and little Nara did too. They were the cutest thing ever, Nara and Grein. Then they were a little careless, and Nara got with child.” The old dwarf’s face darkened at that memory. “They really were good kids you know. They came to me when they started suspecting something, and I confirmed it. Wanted to get married, these two. So Grein went home to tell her mother, and Nara told her family. But old Nern didn’t take it so well.”

“Ori said that his father and grandfather had killed her,” Fili said hesitantly.

He had thought at the time that Ori had exaggerated, because _no one_ really killed a bearer just for being with child. But that had been before he’d met Ori’s family, and he had never really thought about it again after that. Ori had never mentioned his aunt again, nor had anyone else, and Fili might have doubted she had ever existed, if not for the fact that Ori didn’t lie that way.

“They sent for me when the deed was done,” Oin muttered grimly. “Said that they had talked with her and she’d agreed that she couldn’t have a child because she wasn’t ‘right in the head’, to use Nern’s words. Said she’d agreed to take something to get rid of the baby, but she’d taken too much. Couldn’t explain the bruises though. They tried to say she’d fallen in the stairs, as if I’d never heard _that_ before. Grein asked for a trial when she came back, and old Nern got to visit the jail of Ered Luin for a couple years. Not enough if you ask me, but no one could prove that they’d really been trying to _kill_ little Nara. An accident, they said. Pah!”

Fili nodded. Knowing Naren, the only thing accidental about all that must have been that Oin had been too good a healer to believe their story.

“Grein was never really the same after that,” Oin concluded. “Gave up on healing and became a guard in her mother’s town. Terrible thing to lose a One at the best of times, but like this… And then when little Ori came to me pregnant too… I had told him to go to your mother and uncle and just not tell his family. Learning from my mistakes, and I thought  the child was Kili’s. I would have told him to go to _you_ if I’d known. I couldn’t save little Nara you see, but I thought I might save Ori at least.”

“Maybe he should have listened to you and gone to my uncle,” Fili muttered. “Wouldn’t be in that mess then…”

“What was that?”

Fili winced. The last thing he wanted was to discuss his sentimental life with someone he needed to shout at to be heard. Bad enough that the entire camp probably knew about Ori’s aunt now, Fili did not want anyone to pity or judge him on top of that.

“I was just saying that things would have been different if Ori had talked to my uncle first,” Fili said louder.

“Hope not,” Oin retorted. “Last I saw him, he looked happier than he’d been since Ered Luin. I wouldn’t have bet on it, but you’re good for him. Things are turning out fairly well so far, aren’t they?”

Fili smiled weakly, and looked back at his uncle’s letter. Things _had_ been going well enough, until he had messed it up.

 

Whether it was because Oin had been heard by the entire camp, or because more people worried about him than Fili had realised, Luda came that same day to talk to him. Fili wished she had chosen a moment when they were not walking toward another spider nest that Tauriel had found, but he was getting rather used to having his wishes ignored.

“All I’m saying is, if you had a fight before you left, you should write to him,” she explained. “Even if you’re still angry, tell him you love him, that sort of things. Just that: ‘hey, you’re a dumbass who made the kitchen explode again, and I’m mad at you for that, but I still love you.’ It’s easy, you’re not stepping on your pride, but you’re not also letting pride destroy things.”

“How often did you wife write these exact words to you?”

“Never at all because I destroyed the kitchen _before_ we tried the whole communication thing. But we have agreed that she’d do it if it happened again. We also agreed that when we got a house together, I’d have a room just to play around, and that she’d make me sleep on the couch permanently if I ever experimented in the kitchen again.”

Fili could not help a snigger.

“I hope to meet your wife someday, I think I would like her.”

“Write to your husband,” Luda retorted, “and I’ll think about _maybe_ letting you have the immense _privilege_ of meeting Tes.”

This time Fili truly laughed, for what felt like the first time in ages.

 

Luda’s suggestion of writing turned again and again in his head for the following day. He hadn’t answered to Thorin yet, because he’d wanted to see the new nest before (that one was a little bigger, the spiders a different sort, but nothing that Luda’s explosive wouldn’t take care of). It wouldn’t be a problem at all to write to Ori. There was still a risk the letter falling into the wrong hands, but at this point, the fact that they’d had an argument was barely a secret anymore.

What decided it, in the end, was the memory that Ori was so much more at ease when writing than when talking. Maybe letting him his a way of talking that worked better for him would make things better. Maybe they would manage to remain friends at least, if they could communicate in a way that worked for both of them. Fili could easily live without Ori’s love if it came to that, but he’d grown to depend on his friendship too much to give up just yet.

So he grabbed some paper, and wrote.

 

 

> “Dear Ori
> 
> I hope this letter finds you well.
> 
> First of all, I apologize for my actions that night. I had no right to intrude on your privacy in such a way. My only reasons for doing so were curiosity and a certain degree of fear when I recognised something that looked like a mark under your bracelet. They were not much of an excuse, but for a second I truly thought that there was a person in the world that might make you leave me. As it turns out there is indeed, and that would be me, thanks to the way I keep doing the wrong thing.
> 
> I can’t blame Kili nor you for keeping your marks from me. I had not really proven to be a model of kindness and understanding when it came to your relationship. I wish I could go back in time, and slap myself in the face for ever making Kili be afraid of me. I had never realised that he was. But I must say I am hurt that you still felt you had to hide this from me. I thought I had shown you that I had overgrown my jealousy… I suppose I had not shown it enough. I will try to make more efforts on the future. Your friendship is important to me, and I will do all that it takes not to lose it.
> 
> And for a start, I will ask you to forget what I said about loving you. Not because it is not true, but because I said it thinking that I had already lost your friendship. I promise you that if you give me another chance, I will never again speak of this. Your friendship is what I value above all else, and it is the only thing I need.
> 
> If you decide that you do not want to forgive this newest mistake of mine, I will understand of course. If you feel that you can’t be comfortable around me anymore, I will talk to my mother and we will find you new apartments, for you and Kis, away from me. My only request will be to have the right to see her regularly, once a week at least. I did not sire her, but she is still my daughter, and I could not bear to lose her entirely. As long as you allow this, I will accept any other conditions that you’ll demand. You can even state that Sain will have to stay the entire time, or Dori, or anything else that you like.
> 
> I am sorry about everything that happened
> 
> Fili”

 

If anyone ever found that letter, the secret was more than out, but the risk was worth it, Fili decided. He could only hope that his uncle wouldn’t have the curiosity to read this, but even if he did, the consequences would just be dealt with. It wouldn’t really surprise anyone if it turned out that Kis was Kili’s anyway, and it would not really change anything.

Fili felt lighter as he watched the raven fly away with its two letters. One way or another, things would be settled soon.

Distracted by the sight of the flying bird, it took Fili a moment to noticed that there was a bit of a commotion near the entrance of the camp. The scouts sent observing the new spider nest had returned it seemed, and they sounded rather worried, even from a distance.

“We lost them around the other nest,” Fili heard as he came closer. “But that’s just because they seemed so angry to find it destroyed and they were too distracted to chase us anymore!”

“Are you sure they didn’t saw you coming here?” Tauriel asked the scout.

“We didn’t come back the usual way, but we’ve all been so often to the nest, there’s a path there now, and if they notice it…”

“What is going on here?” Fili asked. “Spiders?”

The scout (Eren, hir name was) stepped back from Fili, as if he might get punished for something.

“It was a trap!” ze explained. “We’d gone to the new nest as usual, and we were careful, but they must have guessed we were coming because suddenly there were five of them surrounding us. We managed to kill three of them, but the last two left to call for help. We ran away, and we weren’t too careful about directions so we ended up in the old nest and that’s where they caught up with us. They got all excited when they saw everything had been burnt down, and we took advantage of that, and I swear we did all we could to make sure they were not following us, but…”

“You did what you could,” Fili assured hir. “No one is blaming you. But now, we must prepare for an attack. Where is Luda?”

“She’s out of the camp, testing something new,” Tauriel informed him. “Highness, I am sorry, I had never known spiders to show any sort of concern over other nests, or else…”

“These spiders are different, they seem smarter,” Fili cut her. “We couldn’t guess. Now run to warn Luda that we need her.” Tauriel dashed away, and Fili turned to the rest of the little crowd. “Farin, ring the alarm, everyone must be back within the camp in five minutes at most, and I want us all to be ready to fight in ten! That means protections and weapons. All previous limitations about the use of incendiary and explosive weapons are cancelled for the time of the alert. I’d rather deal with a fire than have anyone get killed!”

Everyone sprang into action then. Fili paid it little mind. They had been drilled for this a few times, and Fili trusted that everyone would know what they had to do. So he left them to it, and went to find the second raven that had come with them.

“Here is your mission,” he told it. “If you see anyone get hurt by a spider, I want you to immediately fly to Erebor to tell them what is going on.”

“Shan’t I rather wait until you’re in real trouble?”

“We have bows and bombs. If they are close enough to harm us, the trouble is already real. Erebor won’t reach us in time to help, but they will send soldiers and healers, and that might mean the difference between life and death for anyone wounded or captured.”

Or it might just mean that their bodies would be returned to the stone more quickly, but that was better left unsaid. There were people around. They could not go into battle knowing that their leader was considering the option of their death. And that was because none of them would die, Fili decided. He wouldn’t allow it.

People who had been outside the camp had just returned when the spiders emerged from the forest. There were about two dozen, not the entire nest by far, but enough to make for a difficult fight.

“Stand your ground,” Fili ordered. “Do not let them come near us. We are stronger at a distance, _don’t_ let them come close! Now prepare you arrows and at my signal, fire!”

Fili raised his hand, the sharp smell of the arrows surrounding him. He lowered it, and the five closest spiders were hit, not one arrow missing. The creatures did not stop or slow down though, but seemed to speed up instead. No one waiting for Fili’s order to fire again, and this time three spiders came down, only to be trampled by the others.

“Try for the bombs!” Fili shouted, grabbing one himself and throwing it as far as he could.

They got another five spiders down that way, but the others were still not stopping and reached the camp. Everyone let go of their bows to grab a sword, a warhammer, or whatever else close range weapon they were more comfortable with. Fili had his twin blades, and he raised them high above him, catching a glimpse of the raven leaving already.

“For Erebor!” he shouted, before running toward the spiders.

The others followed fearlessly, shouting back any war cry that gave them the most courage. The spiders hissed in return, until the dwarves started striking. Fili killed the first one that came close to him with a single blow, then helped Farin take down a second one. Luda and Tauriel killed a third that had gotten too close to him, and after that Fili lost count. All he could do was strike again and again, avoiding claws and fangs.

Until one spider managed to knock him down and pin him to the ground. He could not avoid the fangs that time, and could not escape when the burning cold of the poison spread through him, making him lose first the use of his limbs, and then his consciousness entirely.


	28. Back in Erebor

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Fili wakes up

There was movement around him, and something that Fili distantly recognised as the rough rumble of a cart moving too fast. It made him smile. Or at least, it made him want to smile, though he wasn’t sure it reached his face.

Either help had come from Erebor or the rest of the company had fared better than him, or else he wouldn’t be in a moving cart.

He was alive and others had to be too.

Mahal couldn’t be so cruel as to force him to live through the guilt of _surviving_ again, he decided as he lost consciousness once more.

 

Next time he woke up, Fili was in his own bed, in Erebor. There were people around him, talking. He thought he could hear his mother’s voice, and his uncle’s. Tauriel’s too, but he was less sure about that. There was someone on a chair by his bed that looked like Ori, and he would never have been anywhere near the elf. Then again, he probably didn’t want to be anywhere near Fili either, so it might have been _him_ who wasn’t really there.

 

The third time Fili regained consciousness was much better. His head and body no longer felt filled with lead and jelly, and he could see and hear far more clearly. It was indeed in his bed that he was lying. There was an uncomfortable sensation on the side of his stomach. Not exactly painful, but certainly unpleasant. It itched, but Fili didn’t really have the energy to scratch himself, nor even to move into a more comfortable position. He did manage to have a look around though, and saw his mother sitting by his bed. She was reading something, and it made him smile. Trust Dis to make full use of her time, even when watching over her son.

“Hello mom. How are you doing?”

Dis yelped when she heard his voice, and all but threw herself at his neck.

“You’re awake!” She cried. “Oh, Ori had said that he’d seen you open your eyes, but we weren’t sure… How do you feel? Does anything hurt? Are you hungry? I have some broth here… It’s gone cold I think, but it’ll do you good. Do you think you _can_ eat?”

“I’ve felt better,” Fili confessed. “And I’m not really hungry? I’m just… tired. And my stomach itches like mad. A bit like that time Kili and I hid in nettles, but worse.”

“Don’t scratch yourself,” Dis ordered as she took the bowl of broth from his night table. “Tauriel says it will be sure to leave a scar if you scratch. Now open your mouth. You have to eat something to get better.”

Fili opened his mouth, then at the last moment pushed away the spoon, spilling its content on his bed.

“ _Ori was here_?”

Dis sighed in that long suffering way she used to have in Ered Luin, when Fili would ask where Kili had disappeared to.

“We’ve just sent him to bed two hours ago,” she explained. “Well, I say sent… He was falling asleep on the chair, and Dori had to carry him to his room. He hadn’t left you since you got back here, unless absolutely forced to. And I used to think that boy was so reasonable! But no, he’s just as bad as the rest of you.”

Fili did not know what to think of that, and his mother took advantage of his confusion to feed him more broth. It tasted nice enough, so he didn’t protest. He was too busy trying to make sense of the idea of Ori staying with him. Maybe it meant that Ori still felt friendship for him. From anyone else, Fili might have suspected that it was just done out of duty, or to continue the charade of a happy marriage, but Ori did not lie like that. If he had been there, then it was because he had wanted to. That thought gave Fili new strength.

Ot that might just have been the broth.

“You’ve been out for the better part of three days, since you didn’t ask,” Dis announced as she continued to fed him. It was comfortable, in an odd way. Like he was a small child once more. He didn’t really miss being little, but it was nice to be taken care of. “Tauriel was fairly sure that you would make it out alive, if only because you had not died on the way to Erebor and the first hours are the most critical. I was not so sure though. You were so _pale_. And that bite looked so…”

She looked down at the spoon in her hand, face tight with worry.

“Don’t do that to me, Fili,” she begged. “I cannot survive both my sons. You cannot do that to me. You have to take better care of yourself. If not for yourself, or for Ori and Kis, then do it for me at least.”

“I’ll do my best,” Fili promised. “It was an _accident_ you know,” he added, to comfort her.

“It’s always an accident when young people die,” Dis retorted. “It doesn’t make them any less dead.”

Fili did not insist. He just hoped that his mother and uncle wouldn’t decide to keep him away from Mirkwood from then on. He wasn’t sure how he felt about the job itself, but he liked the people there.

If there were still people there at all.

“What about the others?” he asked his mother, panicked at the idea that Tauriel and him might have been the only survivors. “Did they… did the spiders…”

“An akôn called Eren and a man called Frir were brought back with you to Erebor by Tauriel and one of your soldiers. No one else needed urgent care, so they stayed there, with the reinforcements that your uncle sent. I think the person in charge is a certain Luda?”

Fili instantly relaxed, and smiled. Luda had already proven that she could be in charge, and if she had enough people to help her, and enough powder, she’d soon take care of these spiders.

So Fili let his mother feed him the rest of the broth, and before long, he fell asleep once more.

 

Ori was there next time Fili woke up.

Sitting on the chair where Dis had been. There were dark shadows under his eyes, and his hair was a mess, with none of the braids he usually wore in it. He was staring fixedly at something on the floor, until Fili tried to move and caught his attention.

“You can’t make Kis an orphan,” Ori said accusingly in place of greetings, still glaring at the ground.

“I won’t.”

“You can’t make _me_ a widower either.”

“I promise to try my best,” Fili promised. He couldn’t decide if he was touched that everyone so wanted him alive, or a little hurt that they didn’t trust him more.

He was starting to see why it so annoyed Kili when people called him reckless.

“Your mother said you had to eat,” Ori informed him. “I have to call the servants and ask for food. Are you hungry?”

“Not really,” Fili lied. He _did_ feel some hunger this time, but he didn’t want Ori to leave, not for even a second.

“Can you read?”

The question was odd enough to make Fili frown, but he nodded anyway, and Ori seemed relieved.

“I wrote this for you,” he said, handing Fili a piece of paper. “Before I heard about the attack. I was going to send it to you, but then… then you came back.”

Fili looked at the carefully folded letter that was a little creased from being in a pocket, then at Ori.

“Should I wait until you’re gone to read it?”

The younger dwarf shook his head quickly.

“Now then?”

An eager nod. Fili unfolded the letter, and started reading.

> “Dear Fili,
> 
> You do not always do the wrong thing. You did that night, yes, but you don’t always do the wrong thing. You don’t even often do the wrong thing. Almost never in fact.
> 
> I am sorry that I hurt you that night, when you saw the mark. I had been very scared about you seeing it for some time now, because I knew things would be different after. I didn’t know what sort of different, but I knew things had become so nice between us, I didn’t want to risk losing that. I would never have expected that some years ago, but you have become so important to me, and I don’t know what I would do without you now. I had not thought much about it until you first left for Mirkwood, but then I realised how much I liked having you near me.
> 
> Or maybe I only realised it when you said you loved me that night. I had never thought about that word for you, but then you used it and I realised that it fit, and that was awful. I really didn’t want to love you. I think I still don’t want to, because you are Kili’s brother and I should not, but whether I like it or not, the feeling is here. And then you sent your letter and I thought that it might not be so bad, so here we are. Maybe we should try this, even if it’s so odd? Because it would be so odd to be friends now, knowing what we both feel, but it would be too awful to go back to being strangers to each other.
> 
> I think I’d really like to try being a couple, when you are back. I don’t know if it will work, but I want to try. So take care of yourself, and come back soon.
> 
> Ori.”

“Well, I _did_ come back soon,” Fili noted. “I didn’t do so great on the taking care of myself though. Sorry about that. Recklessness runs in the family, I’m told.”

That remark was answered by a glare, and Fili grimaced.

“Not a very good joke, sorry,” he agreed. “Do… do you mean that? About…” He could not say the word love, nor even couple. Just thinking them made him feel a little faint, and he was almost sure it had nothing to do with the spider’s bite. “About trying it?”

“I should not. But I mean it, yes,” Ori sighed, raising one hand to brush his fingers against Fili’s cheek. It made the prince shiver. “You are… better than you think. Better than I used to think. You are _good_. I care about you. A lot.”

Fili nodded and tried to swallow. It had never really occurred to him that Ori might feel the same way he did, and he was a little at a loss on what to do next. There were certainly steps to follow in a new relationship, dates and the like maybe. But Fili was in bed, and likely to stay there for a while longer until he was fully healed, so that wasn’t an option yet. Beside, the point of dates was to get to know someone, and they already did. They’d seen the worst of each other, and probably some of the best too. If they ever went on dates, it would be just to go somewhere fun. Which might also be the point of dates, Fili decided. In any case, it would have to wait until he was better.

There were maybe other things they could do now though.

“Does it mean that kissing might happen now?” Fili asked. “I mean, not right now if you don’t want to, but is it something we might do someday, or would it be weird for you?”

“You’re wounded,” Ori pointed out.

“Not on the face,” Fili replied with a smirk. “But it’s okay if you don’t want to anyway. We can do that later... or not at all if you don't want to.”

For a moment Ori pondered about it, his head tilted to the side. He did not seem to notice it when he removed his hand from Fili's cheek, nor when he started fidgeting his leather bracelet. That had to mean he would decide against it, Fili decided.

That Ori rose a little from his chair and bent to press their lips together was more than unexpected. It was a good surprise though. Fili's lips were a little parched, but Ori's were soft, and the sensation of their moustaches rubbing together was strange and pleasant.

“It's odd,” Ori said as he pulled back, more quickly than Fili would have liked.

“It's okay if you don't like it,” Fili assured him, trying not to sound disappointed it.

He had found it quite nice himself, but it would have to be weird for Ori, kissing his dead lover's brother. Or maybe it was just that Fili was awful at it, so awful that there was just no hope he could ever learn to do better.

“I said it was odd, not bad,” Ori protested with a frown. “I want to kiss you again. But you have to eat first. I promised you would eat. Your mother will be angry.”

“And we certainly don't want that,” Fili agreed. “Fine, go ask for food. And then, while we wait for it, maybe you can kiss me more?”

Ori thought about it, and shook his head.

“After you've eaten,” he decided. “That way, you're sure to eat.”

“You are cruel,” Fili pouted. “But fine. I'll eat anything you like, if it'll make you kiss me more.”

That made Ori blush, but he smiled too, and he looked so pretty like that, Fili wished he could have kissed him right then and there. It was a good motivation to get better fast, all in all; it would be so much easier to kiss Ori when he wouldn't feel so weak anymore.

“Wait, I've remembered something!” he exclaimed as Ori started walking toward the door. “I fell asleep right after I ate, last time. What if it happens again this time? It'd be safer to kiss me before, I think.”

“I'll kiss you when you wake up,” Ori retorted, smiling a little more. “Unless you have bad breath. Then you'll have to wait more.”

Fili grimaced. “I'll try not to fall asleep then.”

Ori chuckled, and nodded eagerly before he left the room.


	29. changes

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> the chapter where there is some getting used to the changes, and smut

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> in which, after being ignored for nearly 30 chapters, the fact that there is a third sex among dwarves come into play  
> in my defense, the original plan included sex scenes WAY earlier than that orz although  
> also, I've decided that there would be an epilogue of sorts after this

It was a full two weeks before Fili was allowed to leave his bed. The spider's poison made his wound heal far more slowly than it should have, and the creature had managed to start actually biting into him before it was taken down.

It was not a very fun two weeks, but in the end, Fili wondered if it wasn't better that way. It forced Ori and him to take things slow, and it gave them plenty of time to talk about what would change between them, and what wouldn't.

Ori still wanted to sleep alone sometimes, and he made it clear that he needed to keep a room of his own, which Fili agreed with. Having separate rooms had worked well so far, especially whenever they'd had arguments, and he'd long ago accepted that his husband needed some space and quiet sometimes. So did Fili himself, anyway. They also agreed that, until they figured out if being lovers rather than friends worked for them, they would act as usual in public. Ori was terrified that they would get teased by everyone if they so much as held hands where someone might see, and Fili thought he was right. If everyone really thought that they had become lovers some months earlier, they wouldn't resist making comments about it. They did not need that extra problem to make things more difficult, so secrecy would be the best solution until they felt confident.

“Can we kiss around Kis though?” Fili asked. “You always look so happy when you're playing with her, I am pretty sure I'll want to kiss you sometimes.”

“I think the same, so yes,” Ori decided. “But not if Sain might come in.”

“But that means not kisses in the morning!” Fili protested. “And that's always been when I want to kiss you most!”

Ori rolled his eyes. Fili had said the exact same thing about every single part of the day so far, but it was _particularly_ true of mornings, because his husband looked so adorable with his hair sticking in every direction.

“Fine for mornings,” Ori magnanimously agreed.

“And what about now? I want to kiss you _now_. Can we?”

Ori rolled his eyes again, but Fili got his kiss.

 

Other discussions did not go so well. Fili was extremely unhappy when Ori, Dis and Thorin ganged up to ask him to leave the cleansing of Mirkwood to Luda. After all that Thorin had said about it being a good occasion for him to work on leadership, being asked to drop everything made Fili feel as if he'd failed. His uncle tried to suggest that once the forest was deemed safe, he might be put in charge of the camp once more to supervise the workers that would go there, but that sounded like cheating and Fili said it. Or rather, he shouted it, before demanding to be left alone. He had _not_ liked Mirkwood, but he had made friends, Luda and Tauriel mostly, and he had liked the feeling of being active and _useful_. It had been more fun than dealing with paperwork in Erebor, anyway.

Then, a few hours later, Ori came back, Kis in his arms. It was the first time Fili had seen her since his return. It had been decided he needed a calm environment which was not always possible with a toddler around. Beside, she liked nothing more than jump on his stomach, which wasn't the best of ideas at the time.

She was extremely agitated when she saw Fili, pushing and kicking to get away from Ori's arms when he sat by the bed. Fili could only smile at her. He tried to caress her cheek to calm her down, but she grabbed his hand in one of hers and wouldn't let go.

“Ada!” she begged, trying to reach for him with her free hand. “Ada!”

Fili gasped and stared at her in wonder, before looking up at Ori who shook his head, just as surprised as his husband by their daughter's first word.

“Give her to me,” Fili ask.

“Your stomach...”

“She'll be calm when she's in my arms, I'm sure. Beside, she's deserved it, don't you think?”

Ori frowned, not fully convinced by that reasoning, but he put Kis on the bed anyway, on Fili's unhurt side.

“Ada!” Kis giggled, pressing herself against Fili's chest. “Ada!”

“Adad is here my precious,” the prince replied, kissing the top of her head. “Adad missed you a lot too, and now you've gone and become a big girl who can talk! You're a very clever little princess, do you know that?” He turned to look at Ori, and smiled. “How about you come join the cuddle party? There's plenty of space in the bed you know, and I rather feel like being cuddled. Unless you're not in the mood of course.”

But Ori did not mind physical contact at that moment, and so he was quick to climb on the bed with them. He even tried to kiss Fili, but that didn't last long; Kis did not appreciate not having their full attention, and she mercilessly hit their heads for not playing with her until they did.

The following morning, Fili asked his mother to tell Thorin that he agreed to leave the commandment of the spider corps to Luda. He had a husband and a daughter to think of after all, and his duty to the kingdom came after that.

 

Then, at last, Fili was allowed to leave his bed. The healer who had taken care of him advised him not to push himself, but that was a warning he would not have needed. After such a long period of inactivity, just walking felt a little strange, although he was assured that after a day or two, he wouldn't feel it anymore.

It was not so strange that he couldn't walk to Ori's room that night, anyway. And he'd made sure to rest a lot the whole day in preparation of that, too.

He'd had time to _think_ in these two weeks, and he had something to ask of Ori, but only if he could have the energy to go through with it.

Fili waited until the were both in bed, and Ori had blown out all the candles. It was easier to be brave in the dark, he'd decided, at least for something like that. As he had hoped, Ori did not lose time before he came to cuddle him and before long they were lying side by side and kissing slowly. It was so nice, just that, that Fili almost decided that it wasn't the moment to ask what he had in mind. At the same time, he wasn't sure he'd have the courage again if he didn't do it right then, so he reluctantly pulled away from the kiss.

“I was wondering something,” he explained, which he had decided was the least bad way of going about that. “When I found that... _toy_ under your bed, you said that it was okay not to know what I wanted.”

“Yes,” Ori replied gently, and Fili could almost hear him smile, even if he didn't see it.

“You also said that if I wanted help figuring it out, you'd help me. And I was wondering. Well, I was wondering, was that just a joke, or did you mean it? Because if it was a joke, then it's fine of course! But if it wasn't one...”

Fili trailed off. He'd prepared a very nice little speech, but suddenly the words wouldn't come, and he just felt like a fool for daring to consider such a thing.

“You want to know if I want sex with you,” Ori stated. Fili nodded, and the younger dwarf kissed his cheek. “Yes.”

Fili felt breathless for a second, and horribly warm. It sounded so _easy_ when Ori said it, almost as if it were obvious to him that he would want Fili.

“Now?” the prince squeaked. “Tonight?”

“Your wound?”

“It doesn't hurt at all. Hasn't hurt in days. I'm fine, and I... I _want_ to try?”

There was a moment of silence as Ori considered it, and then Fili was being kissed gently and held close.

“What do you like?” Ori asked.

“What do you mean?”

“How do you... when you...”

The younger dwarf had to stop for a second to figure out the words to use and push them out of his throat. Fili wondered if it wouldn't have been better to keep the light on, because it was far too dark to use Iglishmek. But then, Fili would have seen Ori, and be seen by him, and he wasn't sure he could handle that just yet. Maybe another time, if this worked for them and there was another time, but for now darkness felt safer.

“How do you touch yourself?” Ori finally managed to say.

“Oh,” Fili mumbled. And then, “I try not to, usually. It's a bother, so I ignore it if I can and wait for the feeling to go away. But if I _have_ to do it, I just try to be very quick.”

Which didn't really answer the question of course, but it was the truth. He didn't dare say that lately it had been a lot more difficult to ignore, especially whenever he'd let himself think of Ori for too long.

“Sure you _want_ this?” Ori asked worriedly. “It's okay if you don't. I can take care of myself. Don't mind it, either.”

“I've never wanted this before, but with you, I really think I do,” Fili tried to explain. “I don't know if I'll like being touched, or touching someone, but I really, really want to try at least. I keep thinking about it since...”

“Since the toy?” Ori suggested, and he had to be smiling, Fili was sure of it.

“Since before that. Since you asked me to sleep with you for the anniversary of the battle. I don't think I really realized it back then, but I've had that in mind since that time, in a way.”

“Oh.”

Silence fell between them, and Fili feared he had ruined everything. He then felt Ori move, and lips against his.

“There’s ass, cave and cock,” Ori said calmly. “Better leave ass for another time. Means I would touch your cave and your cock. Also your chest if you like that. I can try touching you? We see if you like it. If you don't, we'll go to sleep.”

It really was a mercy that they were in the dark, because Fili had never blushed so hard in his life. He would never have managed to use words that were so _blunt_ , but Ori had said them as if it were natural to him. But much as he was embarrassed, Fili could feel a warmth building in his lower stomach. It was all scary, but he _wanted_ to try.

“Could I try touching you too though, before we stop? Even if I don't like it for me, maybe I could like doing it to you. That happens, right?”

Fili felt his husband nod before Ori kissed him again. It was slow and tender at first, as most of their kisses had been so far. Fili relaxed slowly, losing himself to the taste and softness of Ori's lips, and started forgetting that there even was more planned. He moaned when Ori gently bit his lower lip, and again when he felt a tongue licking the inside of that lip. Instinctively Fili opened his mouth, and Ori deepened the kiss, pressing himself closer to the prince.

At some point, one of Ori's hand came to rest on Fili's thigh, just above his knee, and rubbed soothing circles then. It moved higher and higher as their kiss grew more heated, eventually slipping under Fili's nightshirt. He had no time to think about it though, because Ori started sucking on his tongue, while the hand just stayed unmoving, right where his leg met his body. Fili had almost entirely forgotten about it when Ori move his hand again to cup his groin, and at that point everything felt too nice to worry anyway.

“Is that okay?” Ori still asked, his fingers brushing against Fili's cock.

There was, then, a brief moment of doubt. It _did_ feel nice to be touched there, more than Fili's few experimentations had lead him to expect, but what if Ori judged him? Furkhsulâl's cocks were never as big as male's ones at the best of time, but Fili's one was on the smaller side even for a furkhsulâl. He'd never minded before, rather happy in fact that he didn't have to deal with anything too bothersome, but he wasn't sure that would be very nice for Ori.

“Fili?”

Ori's hand started moving away, but Fili stopped him.

“It's okay, it's nice, it's really nice!” the prince whispered urgently. “I like it. I was just thinking... I'm really small.”

Ori didn't answer straight away, and instead stroked Fili's cock lightly, making him shiver.

“It's small,” Ori agreed with a kiss to his husband's cheek. “It'll be so _easy_ to have it in my mouth.”

The thought, combined with the way Ori's thumb brushed against the head of his cock, made Fili whimper. He could feel also wetness seeping from his cave, and that made him kiss Ori hard. He'd almost never managed to feel excited enough to have any reaction there, only playing with his cock when something had to be done, but Ori had made him wet so easily. The other dwarf must have noticed it too, because he let go of Fili's cock and rubbed his fingers on the slick spot that was forming inside his thighs.

“Do you ever... touch there?” Ori asked.

“Never,” Fili replied, because it was easier than to explain that he'd tried sometimes and it had just been sort of unpleasant and painful. “I want you to though, _please_?”

Ori removed his hand from Fili's legs to push on his shoulder until the prince laid on his back. It was a much more intimidating position somehow, especially when he felt Ori position himself between his legs. Fili tensed, until he felt a kiss on his stomach.

“Just fingers now,” Ori promised. “But it's easier? That way... One hand for you cave, one for your cock? It'll be nicer. Unless you don't want...”

“I want it. I really, really, _really_ want it. Please, I swear I want it.”

That sounded a little too desperate maybe, but when one of Ori's hand started stroking and caressing his cock again, Fili didn't really care. It was just that for a long moment, Ori rubbing his cock gently until Fili was breathing too hard and too loud. He didn't notice straight away when Ori's other hand moved between his legs, pushing between his folds. Before Fili could really think about it, one finger was inside.

It was not particularly pleasant, although it certainly didn't hurt like his own attempts had. There was a slight burn, but he dared not mention it for fear that Ori stopped everything. It did hurt a little when Ori's finger started moving, the burn intensifying until Fili started of thinking they should just stop entirely. Before he could figure out how to ask that though, Ori touched something inside of him that made him gasp and shiver.

There was no more sensation of burning after that, or if there was, it was easily drowned out by the pleasure he felt every time Ori reached that place within him. Fili was shivering and whimpering in a way that ought to have been embarrassing but he didn't care because all he wanted was more of it. Then Ori moved again the hand on his cock at the same rhythm as the one inside of him, and Fili whined as he came.

It took him a moment to catch his breathe again after that. He felt as every single bone of his body had turned to water, and it was the most wonderful thing ever. It became better yet when Ori moved to lie beside him once more and kissed his cheek.

“Good,” Fili gasped breathlessly. “Sex, yes. Good. Very yes.”

Ori laughed, and nuzzled the crook of his neck, planting a few kisses there now and then. As he came back from his high, Fili realised that he could feel the other dwarf's cock against his hip. It would have scared him, once, but now he just wanted Ori to feel good too.

“Can I touch you too now?” he asked.

“If you want,” Ori replied with a kiss to his neck. “But not inside? I'm... not inside. Not now.”

Fili nodded, and felt somewhat relieved. It was too easy to do something painful that way, he wasn't sure he'd have dared it yet anyway. He didn't go straight for Ori's cock either though, but instead let his hands wander a moment on his husband chest. Even through Ori's night clothes, his breast were soft to the touch and warm. Fili wondered if it would be acceptable to touch them directly. He very much wanted to, and maybe even to kiss them, but he did not dare, so he just played with them through the fabric.

“I like having them sucked,” Ori informed him casually, and Fili stopped moving for a moment, his mind burning with that idea. “But not now, because of the milk. When Kis is older, if you want.”

“I _will_ want,” Fili promised him.

For now though, he let his hand wander lower, to reach the place where Ori's hard cock tented his shirt. Fili took it in hand though the fabric and squeezed gently, which got him a sigh. He liked the sound of it, so he gathered his courage and pushed away the shirt before bringing back his hand to Ori's cock.

Ever since the whole company had bathed together during their travels, Fili had know that Ori's cock was bigger and longer than his. Seeing it had even led him to believe that Ori was male rather than furkhsulâl, until that night that had started it all. It was strange to feel it in his hand, bigger and heavier and so entirely unlike his own. But when he brushed his thumb against the head of it Ori sighed shakily, and Fili decided that they were not so different after all.

“How do you like it?” he asked, recalling his husband earlier's question.

“Need slick,” Ori breathed. “Then tight and near the head.”

Fili nodded, and removed his hand a moment to spit in it. He grasped Ori's cock again, a little tighter, and was rewarded by a pleased little groan when he started moving his hand. It was almost the only noise that Ori let out the entire time, but his hips moved to thrust into Fili's fist, slow at first and then faster until all the prince could do was follow the rhythm and kiss his husband's neck. His wrist was starting to hurt from the unusual movement when Ori let out a strangled cry and tensed before spilling over his stomach and Fili's hand.

They would have to do that with the light on, Fili decided as he waited for Ori to calm down. He wanted to see his husband's pleasure, even if there was to be some embarrassment before that over being seen naked. He was sure he would want to kiss Ori if he saw him reaching his peak, and he did not want to miss a single moment of wanting to kiss Ori.

“Was nice,” Ori yawned eventually.

“It was. I really liked it. Both things. Was... was I okay? Do you think we can do it again?”

“Later,” Ori agreed sleepily. “Now clean up, and sleep.”

That was a plan that Fili could not protest again.

But he did add a personal touch to it, kissing Ori's mouth before he got up to search for water and a towel.


	30. epilogue

Fili had just finished dressing up when Ori came to his room, follow closely by Kis in her nightshirt, and put Firin in his arms. The baby did not seem to mind, but Kis stomped and pulled on both her her fathers tunic.

“I want to take Firin!” she demanded. “I can do it! Granny Dis lets me do it, I can take Firin!”

“I am fairly sure that even your grandmother wants you to get dressed before she lets you do anything,” Fili retorted.

“I’m a _princess_ , I don’t _have_ to get dressed!”

Fili looked up at Ori, who rolled his eyes and grabbed Kis. She kicked and shouted that it was lese-majesty (her newest favourite word since Dori had used it jokingly in front of her) but her father held on and left the room with her. Fili followed as far as the drawing room, but he knew better than to try to go help Ori with getting Kis dressed. She’d made it clear his presence was an absolute violation of her intimacy with particularly piercing shouts and screams. Ori was more easily tolerated, although what Kis really liked better was to get dressed by Sain. But Sain had been given a day off for the occasion.

A decision that Fili was starting to regret. Everyone had told him that the sixties would be the most difficult period of having a child, but Kis in her twenties was just as fearsome and rebellious as any adolescent. Fili like to joke that there could be no doubt she was Kili’s daughter, to which Ori usually replied that it made little difference, since it wasn’t _Kili_ who had to deal with her less pleasant moments.

At last, the shouting stopped, and Kis ran out of Ori’s room, dress in a beautiful blue and gold dress that swirl around her at every movement.

“Look adad, I’m _pretty_!” she cried.

“You look like a queen,” Fili agreed, smiling at her, then at Ori who had chosen the fabric and supervised the making of the dress. “Now, remember, you have promised that you would not climb anywhere until the end of the ceremony, and that you would do you very best to keep the dress clean until then.”

“Yes adad,” Kis promised.

She always promised to keep her dress clean and whole, but somehow it never happened. Fili had scolded her at first, but Ori had just started negotiating with her that she had to be careful until everyone had seen her once all clean and pretty before she could start playing. It worked surprisingly well, and Fili had been very amused when he learned that it was how Ari had dealt with Nori when ze’d been younger.

“Are you ready?” Ori asked his husband, taking back Firin in his arms.

Ori was slightly less possessive and protective of Firin than he had been of Kis, but not by much. Fili suspected that the difference came less from his husband than from the fact that himself was less afraid to take care of a baby now, but he had decided to keep that theory to himself. Ori might have _stared_ at him otherwise, the long suffering stare he’d learned by spending too much time with Dis.

“I’m just fine,” Fili said. “Kis, do you want me to carry you?”

“No. A princess is not carried, she walks! I must show my people”

Fili had to bite back a laugh as he nodded solemnly. Dori and Dis might have done too good a job preparing the little princess for her formal introduction as one of the heirs to the throne. At the same time, he could not blame them. The family story was that Fili had cried for his own ceremony, whereas Kili had tried to escape and hadn’t stopped complaining the entire time. Dis couldn’t really be blamed for wanting to be sure her granddaughter would do better than her sons, especially now that the ceremony really meant something once more.

“Well, since we’re all ready, let’s go!” Fili proclaimed. “We don’t want to make Granny Dis wait.”

“Or the kingdom,” Ori added, rolling his eyes.

“My mother is scarier than all of Erebor,” Fili explained, pushing his husband toward the door and kissing his cheek. “So it’d be a good idea to not be late for once.”

“We’re always late because of you, adad!” Kis exclaimed, running to the door. “Come on, hurry, hurry! Or I’ll tell granny that it’s your fault because _I_ was very good!”

Both Fili and Ori laughed at that as they walked toward the door, perhaps a touch faster than they would normally have.

Erebor awaited.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> thank everyone for reading this. It took me longer to complete than I'd hoped, but hey, at least I finished something for once

**Author's Note:**

> a little vocabulary:  
> furkhsulâl: someone who can both bear and sire children  
> akôn: someone who is neither a man nor a woman  
> (the dwarves probably also have the equivalent of genderqueer/genderfluid/agender and other options, but I don't know yet if anyone in the fic will be in that situation)


End file.
